Buddha rakes in ad money on DD talk show

KOLKATA: Sachin Tendulkar can take a walk. Though he is yet to appear for a 30-second commercial endorsing a fizzy cola,West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s presence on the small screen is enough to rake in the moolah for TV show producers.
On Sunday at 8.30 pm, when Bhattacharjee appeared on DD Bangla’s popular talk show Jukti Takko for 90 minutes — answering questions from agrrieved citizens across West Bengal and Bengalis in other states – the channel collected a cool Rs 2.5 lakh in advertisement revenue.
And for once, the viewership of DD Bangla all but outscored Star Sports where Ridley Jacobs and Shivnaraine Chanderpaul were busy sending Indian fielders in a leather hunt.
The 100th episode of the talk show saw the amount flowing into DD’s coffers courtesy advertisments and sponsorships from the West Bengal government, BSNL and others.
The amount, DD commercial department officials admitted on Monday is by far the highest that any episode of Jukti Takko has received — almost twice as much as some other episodes.
“Our advertisement rates remained the same for this episode. For every 10 second slot we charged Rs 2,500 ad the sponsorship rate was Rs 10,000. A sponsor gets 150 seconds of free commercial time during the programme,� a senior commercial executive in Kolkata’s DD office said.
He confirmed that the state government had booked five slots for Sunday’s prime time show and BSNL had become a sponsor.
“Apart from government agencies some private firms too took up the adslots. The total amount is a little over Rs 2.5 lakhs,� he said.
At the end of Sunday’s episode the show’s host for the evening, journalist Ashok Das Gupta hoped the chief minister, “would agree to take part in more such live question and answer sessions in future.�