Its official now. Star has declared war on Sony Entertainment Television and the viewers will get ringside seats as the two channels fight it out over who will rule the weekend.

If Sony‘s honchos had any doubts about how their gameshow "Jeeto Chappar Phaad Ke" hosted by the irrepressible Govinda was doing Star‘s response should put them at ease.

Star, which has enjoyed an amazing run since the launch in July of its hit gameshow "Kaun Banega Crorepati" hosted by Bollywood‘s Big B Amitabh Bachchan, seems to be feeling the heat of competition and is going all out to put a spoke in Sony‘s wheel.

Riding on the success of last Saturday‘s special episode in aid of victims of the Gujarat earthquake where cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and filmstar Madhuri Dixit Nene were invited, Star says it will have more such shows.

Star India CEO Peter Mukherjea, quoted in the Economic Times on Saturday, has said: "Yes, we intend hitting Sony head-on with more special KBC programmes. Sony is strong on weekends and we can?t let them occupy that space." Mukherjea said Star would not be reworking its normal 9 pm-10pm, Monday-to-Thursday schedule but is in the process of devising a strategy of extending KBC on weekends too with special events and celebrity shows. That is not all though. Star is also in the process of devising a strategy of increasing viewer interest in KBC on normal weekdays, which appears to be flagging.

Lucky draws for viewers and specials where couples will be allowed to participate form part of the strategy to pack them in again, Star‘s corporate communications head, Yash Khanna said.

Its official now. Star has declared war on Sony Entertainment Television and the viewers will get ringside seats as the two channels fight it out over who will rule the weekend.

If Sony‘s honchos had any doubts about how their gameshow "Jeeto Chappar Phaad Ke" hosted by the irrepressible Govinda was doing Star‘s response should put them at ease.

Star, which has enjoyed an amazing run since the launch in July of its hit gameshow "Kaun Banega Crorepati" hosted by Bollywood‘s Big B Amitabh Bachchan, seems to be feeling the heat of competition and is going all out to put a spoke in Sony‘s wheel.

Riding on the success of last Saturday‘s special episode in aid of victims of the Gujarat earthquake where cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and filmstar Madhuri Dixit Nene were invited, Star says it will have more such shows.

Star India CEO Peter Mukherjea, quoted in the Economic Times on Saturday, has said: "Yes, we intend hitting Sony head-on with more special KBC programmes. Sony is strong on weekends and we can?t let them occupy that space." Mukherjea said Star would not be reworking its normal 9 pm-10pm, Monday-to-Thursday schedule but is in the process of devising a strategy of extending KBC on weekends too with special events and celebrity shows. That is not all though. Star is also in the process of devising a strategy of increasing viewer interest in KBC on normal weekdays, which appears to be flagging.

Lucky draws for viewers and specials where couples will be allowed to participate form part of the strategy to pack them in again, Star‘s corporate communications head, Yash Khanna said.

Antakshri, the successful game and entertainment show from Zee TV, completes its 400th episode next week and Zee Telefilms is using the occasion in its earthquake relief efforts. This is apart from the fact that the network has also adopted one village for rehabilitation.

‘Antakshari‘ which almost immediately become a runaway success after Zee first introduced it in September 1993, has been running for more than seven years and is one of the channel‘s most popular programmes and has enjoyed consistently high ratings.

The network has decided to arrange special shows where celebrities will participate as contestants and the award money will go towards quake relief. The shoot will take place from Saturday 17 February to 23 February at Water Kingdom at Gorai.

A total of 14 episodes will be shot with celebrities from different fields like news readers, models, pop singers, vintage artists, etc. The list of news readers include names like Shammi Narang, Nidhi Kulpathi, MK Jha, Poonam Sharma, Sadhana Shrivastava, Shahidi and Geetika. The amount that participants win will be handed over to a victim‘s family after the show, who will be a special guest for that event.

Zee Network has already adopted ‘Samakhyali‘ village in Gujarat for rehabilitation. "The other nitty-gritty‘s are in the process of finalisation, and soon we will come out with a proper plan," says a Zee executive.

Looks like the "butts and cleavage" on Fashion Television will be around a while longer.

For how long remains to be seen because the parliamentary panel led by information and broadcasting minister Sushma Swaraj decided on Thursday to convey to the FTV bosses that they drop some of their "objectionable" programmes.

Essentially that their should be less of clothes dropping and more of dressing up in line with "Indian cultural ethos", an all-embracingly vague term if there ever was one.

In other words the guys at FTV will have to tear their hair out finding ways on how to keep the clothes on. A bit of self-censorship should make the channel pass muster seems to be the general sentiment among the committee members.

Swaraj is expected to convey the panel‘s decision to FTV Director Michael Adam when he calls on her in New Delhi next week.