MIB grants license to Sidharth Bhakti

The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) has granted Sarthak Music Pvt. Ltd. the license to launch its upcoming Television channel Sidharth Bhakti.

The Ministry’s permitted private satellite Television channel database was updated today with the new license. I&B Ministry granted the license last month on 17th March. Sidharth Bhakti will be an Odia devotional channel.

The broadcaster now has been granted 3 out of the 4 licenses it applied for. It had earlier been granted the license to launch Sidharth TV and Sidharth Gold. Sidharth TV will be an Odia GEC channel. Sidharth Gold is likely to an Odia movie channel.

The Ministry’s database wasn’t updated with any other change at the time of going to publishing. The number of permitted private satellite TV channels stands at 926.

The channels’s owner is the founder of Sarthak TV. ZEEL had acquired the channel in 2015 with a non-compete clause barring the channel owner from starting a new TV channel for 5 years.

Sitaram Agrawalla headed Sarthak Music Pvt Ltd will be reentering the Odia market under ‘Sidharth’ brand with 4 new satellite TV channels under flagship Sidharth TV brand in GEC, Music & Movies and Devotional. The channels are likely to launch in the second half of 2020 as paid channels.