The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : When will Maa News channel be launched?

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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

When will Maa News channel be launched?

Chiranjeevi, along with actor Nagarjuna, has a stake in Maa TV

Chiru does not want the channel to be seen as his mouthpiece, says an industry observer
There are talks of a Hindi channel showing interest in acquiring a major stake in Maa TV

HYDERABAD: Even as film actor Chiranjeevi took a plunge into the political arena, the question making the rounds is when will Maa TV, the popular Telugu TV channel, launch an exclusive news channel.

All eyes are on the channel, which has made known its intention of adding a round-the-clock news channel to its bouquet of general entertainment and music channels. In fact, the necessary formalities were attended to and even a licence was acquired almost a year ago.

For the past few months, the television industry has been expecting the news channel’s launch to coincide with the megastar’s political foray and, in some ways, serve as a platform for him to reach the masses.

Getting a fillip

Mr. Chiranjeevi has a stake in Maa TV whose board of directors, apart from, him includes Allu Aravind, film actor Nagarjuna, Chalasani Ramesh, N. Prasad of Matrix Labs, C. Ramakrishna, Murali Krishnam Raju who is the chairman and Venkateshwara Raju. It is widely perceived that the channel, which in recent times adopted a corporate culture in its operations, did get a fillip through its association with the two reigning stars of the Telugu silver screen.

There were some initial steps taken towards putting a team together for the news channel but the move has been hanging fire for a few months with some in the industry maintaining that a final nod was awaited from Mr. Chiranjeevi.

But while assumptions on his political moves turned into a reality, uncertainty continues to stalk the channel.

Conceding that a news channel pushing his cause would be an asset for him, industry sources point out that the film star-turned-politician was wary of such a move as of now.

“He does not want a channel to be seen as his mouthpiece and lose credibility,” says an industry observer. At present, the general entertainment channel has four news bulletins each day.

It is pointed out that there are other stakeholders in the channel and they too need to join the decision.

“A channel will be useful, but remember there are other partners too in Maa TV,” points out P.V. Rammohan Naidu, television personality actively involved with the Chiranjeevi camp these days.

Meanwhile, another talk making the rounds these days relates to a Hindi channel keen on acquiring a major stake in Maa TV. The channel sources state that the negotiations were on and in the coming weeks we will see some clarity on the issue.

A senior a head with rival channel says, “If this happens, the Chiru camp might be forced to take a closer look at one of the several news channels that are planning to launch in coming days.”

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