Radio industry welcomes the most awaited phase!

Radio is an immensely powerful medium. Its free-to-air nature alleviated reception, affordability and multiplicity of receiver sets, ease of listenership at all places and at all times discern it from other forms of media and place it at an advantageous position to inform, educate and entertain the people.

The Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today cleared guidelines of the much-delayed FM Radio Phase III expansion. FM Phase-III roll out shortly would ensure availability of 806 radio stations across 283 cities.

Meanwhile, the Cabinet at its meeting also approved increasing the foreign direct investment (FDI) in FM radio channels to 26 per cent from the current 20 per cent.

Even though the first two phases of FM radio expansion have taken place several years ago, the third phase of the process was lying in a midpoint due to disagreement from the industry to certain norms prevalent currently, including royalty to be paid to music companies but now the cabinet has given a green signal.

Adgully spoke to some senior officials from the industry to get their reactions on this much awaited decision..

Tarun Katial, CEO, Reliance Broadcast Network Ltd said, "With expansion of FM radio to 283 cities, FM radio will now touch 90% of Indian population making it truly a common man's medium."

"With this we see a huge expansion in terms of the reach of the medium and therefore in the growth of the industry in terms of revenues, advertisers and investor interest," Apurva added. | By Aanchal Kohli [aanchal(at)adgully.com]