Alokananda Chakraborty
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Walt Disney to offer software to Zee Telefilms and Sun TV

Walt Disney and Zee Telefilms have entered into a one-year contract wherein Walt Disney will supply animation programmes, which will be aired on Zee’s regional channels

agencyfaqs! News Bureau

NEW DELHI, September 24

Walt Disney and Zee Telefilms have entered into a one-year contract wherein Walt Disney will supply animation programmes, which will be aired on Zee's regional channels.

Walt Disney and Zee Telefilms have entered into a one-year contract wherein Walt Disney will supply animation programmes which will be aired on Zee's regional channels.

The programs supplied by Disney will be beamed everyday for half an hour on the four Alpha language channels — Marathi, Bengali, Punjabi and Gujarati. The series of programmes that will run will be the same on all four Alpha channels. Currently, the Disney shows are available in India in Hindi, Telugu and English.

Talking about the launch of these programmes on the Alpha channels, Pratik Basu, CEO, Buena Vista Television India (BVTI), said, "Dubbing the shows for the Alpha channels will take us six weeks and we hope to have these programmes on air by November 1."

Interestingly, Disney and Zee parted ways earlier when Disney pulled out its dubbed Hindi shows from Zee and entered a three-year contract with Sony Television. Even as Good Morning Disney and Disney Hour have shifted to Sony, Zee has a one-hour slot "Nickelodeon on Zee", in Hindi, wherein Zee features dubbed episodes from Nickelodeon's award winning libraries.

Besides Zee, Walt Disney is also keen on finding a slot on the Sun TV-owned Tamil language channel. Basu said that BVTI, which is a division of Walt Disney India, was in advanced stages of negotiation with Sun TV for a slot on its Tamil channel, though it hasn't yet decided on the shows that will be telecast on that channel.

Basu further emphasised that the shows meant for Sun TV's Tamil channel will be exclusive of the shows which will run on Zee's local language channels. Disney has acquired the half-hour slot between 5.30 pm and 6.00 pm on Sun TV for Rs 50,000. Sun TV, like Doordarshan, sells out time slots rather than commission shows from production houses.

BVTI has also secured the terrestrial marketing rights for the ICC cricket knockout tournament for Doordarshan. This would be telecast simultaneously on DD1 and ESPN Star Sports from October 3. BVTI is handling the airtime sales for the event, while the programme rights remain with the group company, Modi Entertainment Network Group. BVTI is targeting a revenue of Rs 25-30 crore from the event.

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