Prasar Bharati plans digital brand to tell India story

Aiming to reinvent itself in the digital era, public broadcaster Prasar Bharati has set its sights on cyberspace to create a distinct digital platform, in addition to Doordarshan and All India Radio (AIR), to tell the India story to the global audience. The proposal to create an exclusive, innovative digital platform gained traction as there is a realisation in Prasar Bharati that many global broadcasting majors like Al Jazeera, Russia Today and NPR of the US have formidable presence on the net. Prasar Bharati Chairman A Surya Prakash has set up a special 'Committee for Digital Platform', which held its first meeting on June 16, to get things moving in this direction, sources told PTI.

Apart from Prakash, who heads the panel, others on the committee include Prasar Bharati Board members Shashi Shekhar Vempati, who heads an online media company, Business executive Sunil Alagh and its Member (Finance) Rajeev Singh. Others on the panel to brainstorm on setting up the digital platform include senior journalist R Jagannathan, academician Vamsee Juluri and entrepreneur Ritesh Bawri, sources said. "The thinking is to create a top digital news brand with international focus, which can present the Indian point of view and perspective on global events," a senior official said. It has been proposed that the digital platform should include a website, a mobile app, social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, G+ etc. It should also have presence on Youtube, WatsApp, Viber etc, sources said. This digital brand should be at par with the best in the world for which capabilities would have to be developed, they added.

The platform could start in English and later branch out to include major global languages like Spanish, French etc, an official said. "The committee in its first meeting deliberated on a range of issues including whether this new entity could come up in Public private partnership mode, technologies to be adopted, manpower matters etc. Decision in this regard will be taken after the committee submit its report to the Prasar Bharati board," a senior official said.