Sony tweaks KBC 7 format; takes prize money to seven crore

The 36-episode season has brought in new lifelines and three questions to reach the hot seat.

Kaun Banega Crorepati has been around for 13 years now and the superstar host of the show reminisces, "I was always afraid if I will be able to deliver". The country has seen him deliver more than expected, and how! The show is currently in its seventh season and has been tweaked for freshness.

To start with, the channel has increased the prize money to Rs 7 crore in the seventh season, through 15 questions. A new multimedia set has been designed at Yash Raj Studios, without adding extra cost for the channel. India is the first country to change the 'Who wants to be a Millionaire' set, worldwide.

While audience poll and phone a friend remain in the Lifeline section, few replacements in the format include '50:50' brought back in place of 'Double dip', 'Flip the question' which replaces 'Expert advice' and 'Tukur tukur' that will click the hour instead of 'Mrs tick ticki'. The fifth and the new lifeline in the format is 'Power Paplu' which can be used to revive a dead lifeline.

Set to start on September, 6 at 8.30 pm, scheduled over the weekends, MSM expects to get its flagship channel, Sony, back on track with Kaun Banega Maha Crorepati (as it is called in this season). The channel is being struggling at No. 4 position in the Hindi GECs list for about a year now.

Produced by Big Synergy Media, the 36-episode Season 7 of the show will pose three questions to the participant to reach the hot seat. The 'Fastest Finger First' round will now be called a 'best out of three' and the winner at the end will enter the hot seat.

Another interesting feature is the 'Play along' for the 'Fastest Finger First' contestants who do not make it to the hot seat. These contestants will now play along with the hot seat contestant and the one who answers the maximum number of questions in the minimum amount of time gets to win Rs 1 lakh at the end of the episode.

The theme of the show, which has always revolved around knowledge, has created a lot of buzz ahead of each season. Season 1 (that was telecast on Star Plus), hosted by Amitabh Bachchan was promoted through taglines like "Ek crore mein kitne zero hote hain?" and "Nau baj gaye kya?".

Season 2 had punch line 'Umeed se dugna', since the prize money was doubled. The third season which was hosted by Shah Rukh Khan sported the line, 'Ek sawaal jo aapki zindagi badal de'. In the fourth season, when the show was shifted to Sony Entertainment Television and brought back Bachchan, had the central theme of 'Koi bhi sawaal chhota nahi hota'.

The campaign for KBC Season 5 had the tagline 'Koi bhi insaan chhota nahi hota', followed by Season 6's communication theme, 'Sirf Gyaan Hi Aapko Aapka Haq Dilata Hai'.

Now, in the upcoming season, the channel will promote the importance of continued learning. The central theme is 'Seekhna Bandh Toh Jeetna Bandh'. The campaign of the show is already out in full swing. The teaser promos of the show started as early as June (when the registrations began), while the KBC canter vans were flagged off by Bachchan during the last week of August.

The channel has made available the earlier seasons of KBC on www.kbcsony.com. To further extend the brand campaign of continued learning, the channel has given options to the viewers to put their learnings to test by playing the KBC game online and on an iOS application. On social media, the viewers can tweet their seekh (learning) of the day using #KBC on @SonyTV on Twitter.

As reported earlier, the show is set to rake in 20 per cent higher revenues than the previous season.