DD Freedish to have new round of e-auction

[Umair Malik]

MUMBAI: After a gap of almost two months, Doordarshan’s subscription-free DTH platform Freedish will have its new round of e-auction to fill up vacant slots.

DD Freedish has set the reserve price per DTH slot at Rs 4.3 crore (Rs 43 million), the same as in the previous round. It will conduct its 28th e-auction on 28 July.

In the 27th e-auction on 30 May, five channels had taken up the slots on DD Freedish. These included two additions, namely Premiere Cinema and 9X Jalwa. Two channels, Vision Shiksha and RT Movies, renewed their slots. Sony Pictures Networks India’s FTA Hindi movie channel Sony Wah, which had taken a slot on pro rata basis earlier, had bagged the slot for a year.

For The 28th e-auction, the last date for submission of application is 28 July, 12 pm. Noida-based C1 India will conduct the e-auction on behalf of Prasar Bharati.

Interested channels will have to submit uplinking and downlinking permission from the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MIB) along with the application. They also have to deposit a participation amount of Rs 1.5 crore (Rs 15 million) as demand draft in favour of DD besides a non-refundable processing fee of Rs 10,000.

Successful channels will have to arrange IRD boxes in advance to place their channel on the platform on time. The EMD drafts will be returned to the unsuccessful bidders within a week or immediately after the completion of the e-auction.

Channels that have won slots on the platform will have to deposit Rs 1.10 crore (Rs 11 million) within one month from the placement of the channel on Freedish along with Service Tax @ 15% on the total bid amount.

The second instalment amounting to Rs 1.10 crore (Rs 11 million) will have to be deposited by the successful channel in the second month from the placement of the channel.

The balance bid amount will have to be deposited on or before six months from the placement of the channel, failing which the deposited amount will be forfeited and channel will be discontinued from the platform after a 21-day discontinuation notice.