Jaitley has been taking the same tack by appearing to have a leaning towardsStar. One will have to wait and watch whether this will be a short-livedromance like Mahajan's. One has not really got a feel of what he is going todo. He has banned Russian channel TB6, lifted the fiat against Pakistan TV,and has said that he was still examining the role of Prasar Bharati. He hasmade some noises about the Broadcasting Regulatory Authority of India, theBroadcasting Bill without spelling out too many details. If he has mentionedDTH, which is being proposed to be made a DD monopoly, not many people haveheard it. Jaitley will have to get his act together sooner than later.

In the meanwhile, to help him and other ministers to make up their minds,the US business lobby is going to pull out all the stops to woo thisgovernment to open media (specifically broadcasting), apart from power,telecom, infrastructure and insurance. Currently, the American BusinessCouncil is doing the rounds of the power ministry. The information andbroadcasting ministry could be one stop they would like to take because ofthe powerful lobby that cable TV, and satellite TV companies go to make upin US.

All of a sudden there has been a lot of camaraderie between India and US,the latter has lifted sanctions against India and President Clinton wants tocome to India sometime early next year. VHP and RSS are likely to force thedomestic broadcasting issue, while BJP will want to balance out things.

Murasoli Maran would like to protect the DMK's Sun TV, though why, only heknows, because the channels in its bouquet are strong enough to repulse anyforeigner and nobody knows the southern language land better than KalanithiMaran. As part of NDA, Murasoli Maran will try his best and put hispolitical muscle behind ensuring the good health of Sun TV though his sonsays that he is capable of battling a challenge from any foreignbroadcasters. It will be interesting to find out what really pans out inIndian broadcasting with Jaitley at the helm. HBO deal finally struckSo Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) won the brawl to bring the movie serviceHBO to India. The difference is that it would be an international servicenot able to air the entire HBO movie library over India. Earlier, TBS wasbidding to bring in HBO Asia to India but Sony, one of the partners in HBOin Asia, objected and said that they should actually launch and distributeit here. However, Sony's appeal that it be given a shot, did not pass musterwith the HBO management. And TBS went back to it and told it that it waswilling to launch the HBO International Service in India. After furtherresistance from Sony, the deal was finally struck recently. HBO, which wasto debut in India about three-four years ago will probably make itsappearance later this year or early next year.

The pricing being talked about in its earlier avatar was about Rs 200 persubscriber. Hopefully, TBS has seen the light and won't take such a radicalpricing strategy for India. Pricing in the range of Rs 10-1 5would be moresuitable to this market.

For viewers, the arrival of HBO will mean better quality movies. And whoknows Cinemax which is perceived by some as an even better channel may alsobe launched in the near future.

The writer is developing an internet portalhttp://www.indiantelevision.com. Write your comments to television@vsnl.comor television@hotmail.com.