Mukerjea’s concern is that the Star India bouquet doesn’t have a children’s channel. He said: "I am looking at this very closely. We are developing our plans to prepare an offering for kids. We have given a brief to our business development people to create an indigenously relevant and yet global look and local in feel channel. This will be locally produced and will be satisfying to the child who is exposed to other forms of similar entertainment around the world."

With India’s demographics altering radically and getting younger, Mukerjea wants to be poised on the springboard to connect with the kids and youth with content which is focused. That is why he has fashioned a news channel—STAR Kids—which will be different. With plans on the drawing board, Mukerjea reckons that the children’s channel will be available in India in the calendar year 2003. He is also keen on bolstering his presence in the regional market. He said: "We are delighted with the way Star Vijay is doing. The jury is out on which other regional language we want to make a foray in, but we believe that the cable and satellite industry’s growth will happen in regional language programming for this will lead to deeper penetration into hitherto unexplored households.

But there are other issues which are top of the mind for Mukerjea. With his Rs. 1,200 crore revenue split between airtime sales (75 per cent) and distribution (25 per cent), he is expecting a decent cumulative profit at the end of this financial year (June 30, 2003). While he understands that the new news channel might require corrections and modifications, it is the Conditional Access System regime which will take up some of his time. He said: "After 10 years at Star in India, the biggest challenge is coming up in six months. We are putting our heads together on this one, all our creative juices are flowing to comprehend the nuances so that one can operate within the stipulated guidelines." Mukerjea is all for the industry to get regulated and systemised, for he thinks there is too much skullduggery. As he stated: "Everyone is unhappy—neighbours, broadcasters, government, you and me—but there will be a period of six to 12 months of serious pain and agony to sort out matters. You might have a situation where the cable operators will actually switch off because the volume of change will be significant."

What is interesting here is that while Star is committed to CAS, it is also concurrently committed to its DTH (direct-to-home) operation. As he said: "We have been waiting for the last 12 months with bated breath. Now we need to take a close look at both CAS and DTH. That is why we are talking to cable operators, our business partners in Hathaway and sister companies, ESPN and Star Sports. Concurrently, we have hired a transponder for DTH."

Mukerjea has a different worldview on CAS and DTH which is pertinent. He said: "It is a fallacy that DTH is targeting the creme de la creme, but I am of the view that these two will end up competing against one another. If you are to invest Rs. 4,000 for a set top box, then you might as well get a DTH connection. We are strategising on this front because I think DTH will end up dovetailing with CAS."

While replying to the debate on the motion of thanks to the Governor’s Address in the State Assembly, she said that in the print media, though the reporters submit their version, the editorial department always ‘edits’ the facts. "It is only the private satellite TV channels that take the details of my reply, made for the people, to the people," she said.

"I have never believed the print media," she said, adding that though the correspondents covering the Assembly proceedings presented a fair picture, the editorial department ‘blacked’ them out in keeping with the respective policies of the organisations.

After being approached by a producer from U. S. TV show Nightline, Michael Kinsley from the webzine ‘Slate’ recently noted that although people pay for cable and satellite, broadcast programmes—such as Nightline—thrive without directly charging their viewers a cent.

"Sure, there are some differences and Web site advertising is unproven but mainstream television itself disproves the notion that giving away content is inherently suicidal," said Kinsley.

And let’s look at something closer to our own hearts: newspapers and magazines. According to Kinsley, newspaper readers don’t really pay for the news; they pay for the paper it’s printed on. Citing that, based on current costs, the Washington Post’s paper content costs about US$ 0.27 per issue and sells for US$ 0.25; the ‘Slate’ editor concludes that distributing the news for free on the Internet is no less absurd.

With magazines, you can forget about paper costs: The money that subscribers pay often doesn’t even cover the amount spent in getting them to subscribe. In fact, most leading print journals would happily provide their customers with free copies if they could prove to advertisers that it was read.