'WAVES already making waves across genres'

Within a month of its launch, the OTT has recorded 1 mn downloads, says Prasar Bharati CEO Gaurav Dwivedi

- Parvez Sultan

PRASAR Bharati chief executive officer Gaurav Dwivedi is highly satisfied with the initial response to the public broadcaster's recently launched OTT service - WAVES. Within a month, it recorded one million downloads. In an interview with Parvez Sultan, Dwivedi also discussed Doordarshan's (DD) content-improvement plans and the Prasar Bharati-Shabd news service. Excerpts:

Finally, Prasar Bharati's WAVES is live. What is your take on the response?

The OTTs are designed for a selective audience; social groups, classes or specific language-speaking populations. After some time, they expand their reach. But our role is that of a public broadcaster, and we don't have target audiences. We should reach out to everyone.

Our previous experiences taught us that things work with the help of partnerships. In the beginning, Doordarshan (DD) was the only channel. We produced programmes but also sourced serials from outside.

DD is known for programmes such as Hum Log, Mahabharata, and Ramayan, produced by outsiders. Similarly, it happened with our radio service and Free Dish. If there was Hawa Mahal, Binaca Geetmala was also popular. On Free Dish, we are not showing DD channels only.

Our experience is that these ideas succeeded in collaboration. We believe that our basic role, the exchange of information, knowledge and entertainment should be democratised to the maximum. Whether it was television, radio or Free Dish, we have played this role. We have exactly replicated this for OTT. We have brought programmes from outside.