Doordarshan's Problems

Sagging Revenues Contd...

Till 1998-99, 70% of HLL's⁹ ad spend went to DD. In 2000-01, because of poor TVR of DD, HLL's share in DD's Ad revenues had gone down to 50%. During 1999-00, producers and distributors stopped giving films to DD after it started asking for a minimum guarantee of Rs 10 mn to broadcast a film. This forced DD to repeat the same old films, and the TVRs went down further. DD's sagging TVRs were a matter of concern for clients like Hindustan Lever - DD's largest advertiser. Said Ashutosh Srivastava, Vice-President HTA-Fulcrum, the media-buying arm of HLL, " Our only source of reaching 40% of this country is going down."

Analysts felt that DD's revenues were going down because advertisers considered it as a downmarket channel, which catered only to the lowest socio-economic classifications, where purchasing power was limited. The revenues earned by DD showed a negative growth during 1997-99. In 1999-00 DD saw its revenues grow by 52.8% but in 2000-01 it was projected to grow at 6% only (refer Table-III).

TABLE III
FALL IN REVENUES OF DD

*Estimated
Source: Businessworld, March 19, 2001.

Tangle of Problems

Analysts felt that many of DD's problems could be attributed to its loss of identity. Said Kiran Karnik, former CEO, Discovery communications India, " The channel has lost its identity. What is Doordarshan: is it a public broadcaster or a commercial entity?" Initially DD officials felt that the National channel would play the role of public broadcaster and DD Metro would be the commercial channel. Private producers and advertisers pointed out that this attitude increased the confusion. They argued that no other network has got two channels competing against each other.

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9] In 1998-99 HLL was highest spender in FMCG sector with advertisement expenditure of Rs 7.2 bn.