DD FreeDish auction: Prasar Bharati bags Rs 862 cr from sale of 46 MPEG-2 slots

Public broadcaster Prasar Bharati has mopped up Rs 862 crore from the e-auction of 46 MPEG-2 slots on DD Free Dish. In last year's annual auction, the pubcaster's total revenue was Rs 1,073 crore from the 65 slots on the DD FreeDish.

On the fifth day of the MPEG-2 auction, 13 channels bagged slots.

In R1, Movies Plus Kammam Malyali and Popular TV secured the slots for Rs 13.30 crore and Rs 13.10 crore respectively. The R1 bucket included all channels not covered in any bucket priced at Rs 3 crore. Manoranjan Tamil Peer bought the slot sold in Bucket R1 for Rs 11.90 crore on day 4. 

In the remaining rounds across buckets, 11 channels bagged the slots including Big Magic in Bucket A+, News24 in Bucket C, Rapchik Bhojpuri in Bucket C, Shemaroo Umang in bucket A+, India TV in Bucket C, Action Movies in bucket A, Dangal 2 in the bucket A+, Goldmines in bucket A, Zee Biscope and Masti in bucket B, and Shemaroo TV in bucket A+.  

The reserve price for the remaining rounds for bucket A+ is Rs 16 crore, bucket A at Rs 13 crore, bucket B at Rs 11 crore, bucket C at Rs 6 crore, bucket d at Rs 7 crore and bucket R1 at Rs 4 crore.  

The pubcaster on day 5 of the auction earned Rs 217.85 crore from 13 channels. 

The DD FreeDish auction began on February 19, 2024. On the first day, only two channels secured the slots for Rs 21.25 crore and Rs 21.15 crore, respectively, in Category A+ (Hindi GEC). The slots were secured by Manoranjan TV Group for its general entertainment channels - Manoranjan Grand and Manoranjan TV.  The reserve price for General Entertainment Channels (GEC) - Hindi or Urdu - in bucket A+ was fixed at Rs 15 crore. 

Prasar Bharati’s earnings skyrocketed on Day 2, with the pubcaster earning Rs 213 crore from the sale of nine channels. Six slots in Bucket A+, which comprises GEC channels, and five slots in bucket A, which comprises movie channels, were sold.

On Day 3, which saw the sale of slots in the crucial news and current affairs (Hindi/Urdu), Prasar Bharati had six news channels buying slots for a total of Rs 112.25 crore. Zee News and NDTV bagged the first two slots for Rs 18.75 crore each. The third slot was picked up by Aaj Tak for Rs 18.85 crore. ABP News, News18 and R Bharat bagged the other three slots for Rs 18.95 crore, Rs 18.95 crore and Rs 18 crore, respectively. 

On Day 4 of the FreeDish auction, eight channels bagged slots for Rs 124.85 in bucket D and one slot in R1 that consists of devotional/spiritual/ayush, all genres of Marathi & Punjabi and news & current affairs (English) channels. 

The channels that bagged slots in bucket D were Russian Today, Sanskaar, Sadhana, Zee Punjabi, Aastha, Sun Marathi, Zee Chitramandir and Manoranjan Movies Punjabi.