MUMBAI: Come the auspicious festival of Baisakhi on 13th of April and BIG 92.7 FM listeners in Delhi, Chandigarh and other Punjab stations will enjoy a volley of offerings lined up by the Stations. Starting on 9 April, BIG FM will customise its programming content in true Punjabi style with oodles of humour, music and contests.

Baisakhi is all about starting afresh and in keeping with this thought, BIG FM has lined up some great on-air and on-ground offerings which will make this festival truly memorable for its listeners.

BIG 92.7 FM?s Delhi Station is all set to make this Baisakhi ?Meetha ? Chatpata ? Namkeen? for its listeners! Delhi-ites don?t need a reason to celebrate and have fun, but live each day to the fullest and it would be no different this Baisakhi. Beginning with the on-air offerings, BIG FM will invite listeners to share their ?Meetha?, ?Chatpata?, and ?Namkeen? moments in the year gone by. Along with this, listeners will also get the opportunity to sing their favourite song in true Punjabi style on-air and win fabulous prizes. As part of the highly engaging on air offerings, an interesting contest will played which will challenge listeners to recite evergreen Bollywood dialogues in Punjabi style! The winners of these contests will get a change to have a Baisakhi special meal with their favourite RJs. On Baisakhi Day, famous Punjabi singer ? Shankar Sahney will visit the BIG FM studios and celebrate the festival with lucky listeners. Shankar will also treat listeners to some excellent music.

At the BIG FM Chandigarh Station, BIG RJs ? Anubhav and Satya will visit the City Centre Shopping Mall and organise various fun contests like ? Lassi Drinking, Turban Tying, Fancy Dress and a special Treasure Hunt. As part of its on-air offering, listeners will get a chance to win special Baisakhi gift vouchers by answering simple questions of the Baisakhi contest.

BIG FM Jalandhar will organize a ?Pagdi Tying? Competition for the Male listeners and a ?Giddha? competition for female listeners at the City Shopping Mall. The city residents will get to win lost of prizes by participating in the Pagdi Tying and Giddha competitions at the shopping malls. The station will also celebrate its 2nd anniversary with some special on air programming mix called ?Double Music? starting from Baisakhi.

Going the traditional way, BIG FM Patiala will celebrate Baisakhi with the Farmers of the adjoining villages. BIG FM?s RJ Rohit will visit various villages adjoining the city with traditional music instruments like the dhol and play them with farmers in a true ?Baisakhi? style. Following the tradition RJ Rohit will also distribute some fresh Ladoos amongst the farmers. The station is plying Punjabi Music to celebrate the spirits of the festival. The Station will also offer some special Punjabi Programming Mix as a part of the Baisakhi celebrations.

Commenting about this festive offering, Mr. Himanshu Shekhar, Regional Head (North & West) ? BIG 92.7 FM, said ?Baisakhi is a festival to celebrate a brand new season and we are extremely excited to celebrate it with our listeners, in true Punjabi style! We look forward to making Baisakhi truly special for them by offering a plethora of programming and on-ground activities which are not only fun to listen to but to participate in too. It is our endeavour at BIG FM to offer listeners superlative quality of entertainment, and occasions and festivals such as Baisakhi become yet another reason to celebrate and ensure high entertainment. We wish all our listeners a very happy Baisakhi.

MUMBAI: Bharat Matrimony and BIG 92.7 FM has come forward to celebrate April 14th, 2009 as ‘Matrimony Day‘ on-air. All the shows of BIG 92.7 FM starting from Kalakkal Kaalai hosted by RJ BIG Dheena will have content based on matrimonial, For example what is Matrimonial day and why is it celebrated etc.

The shows will also have listener‘s point of view on marriages and husband and wife sharing their wedding experience. Apart from innovative content there will also be experts from various fields who will talk about various concepts related to wedding.

There is also an innovative on-air contest, where listeners can get to win cool prizes. If any listener‘s wedding day happens to be on 14th April he/she can SMS to 55454 to enter the contest and win gifts from BIG 92.7 FM.

To know more about ‘Matrimony day‘ tune in to BIG 92.7 FM

MUMBAI: The new season of the MotoGP starts with the season-opener in Qatar, and the race from Losail, followed by the entire season, will be available live and exclusive on Ten Sports, the most watched sports channel in the Sub-continent.

Live telecast of the CommercialBank Grand Prix of Qatar, which is held under lights, starts 10:15 pm IST on Sunday, April 12.

Valentino Rossi begins the defence of his MotoGP World Championship this weekend, and the Yamaha rider is in high spirits ahead of the first race of the year, even though rival Casey Stoner seems to have a hold in Qatar, where the Aussie will be going for his third straight win this year.

Rossi, who won at Losail in 2005 and 2006 but finished fifth last year, said: ?Qatar isn?t one of our strongest tracks, but we still have a few cards to play and I hope that a little more work will see us improve for the first race.?

Rossi?s immediate concern is the pace being shown by Stoner on his Ducati, but the Italian said not much should be read into the tests.

?Tests really mean nothing once you get to racing, the situation is totally different and really we have little idea what will happen until we get there. It?s all very exciting!

?I?m feeling confident, we?re in good shape even if we?re going to what was our worst track during testing, but I am happy about the performance of my M1 in general; Yamaha have done a great job and so this makes me happy.?

Meanwhile, Stoner issued an early warning to his rivals by clocking the fastest time in the first free practice for the season-opening Qatar Grand Prix on Friday, thus laying to rest any worries about his left wrist surgery last November.

Despite no lateral movement in the wrist, he timed 1 minute, 57.053 seconds around 17 laps of the Losail circuit in pleasant conditions. Rossi was second in 1:57.439

MUMBAI: Public Relations Council of India (PRCI), in a glittering function in Bangalore on April 3-4, 2009 presented "Annual PRCI Chanakya Awards 2009" and the "PRCI Corporate Collateral Awards 2009." Deepak Jolly, Vice-President, Public Affairs and Communication, Coca-Cola India, received the PRCI Corporate Collateral Awards 2009. He also spoke about the efforts undertaken by the Coca-Cola towards sustainability.

He specializes in the field of Corporate Communications, Public Policy, Corporate Social Responsibility, Consumer Response and Incident Management & Crisis Resolution. The event also featured the much awaited The ‘Hall of Fame in PR - 2009‘ for communication professionals across the industry during the meet. The meet focused on the role of PR and corporate communications with special emphasis on social issues.

This is the third award in 2009 after Coca-Cola India was conferred upon the Golden Pegasus Award and Golden Peacock Award for their initiatives towards Water and Environment Conservation early this year.

This year‘s theme focused on the various social issues that are affecting the world today, including communal disharmony, terrorism, social intolerance, global warming, female infanticide, meltdown, corruption, traffic woes, water scarcity amongst others and role of communications thereof. The meet also discussed on how, as responsible citizens and as experienced PR communication practitioners, these issues can be tackled and addressed.

MUMBAI: The thrill of A1GP returns to Ten Sports, the most watched sports channel in the Sub-continent, when the brand new circuit in the Algarve hosts the Portugal round of the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport.

A1GP is a unique series, which pits nation against nation in virtually identical single-seater Ferrari cars. Portugal is the sixth round of the 2008/09 season and will feature teams from at least 19 countries, including India, in two races on Sunday, April 12 ? a Sprint race and a Feature race.

Live telecast of the qualifying race starts 6:30 pm IST on Saturday, April 11, followed by the sprints from 6:15 pm IST on Sunday, April 12.

The last A1GP meeting held in Portugal took place at the Circuito do Estoril, near Lisbon in 2005, but with a new purpose-built facility completed earlier this year, the 4.69-kilometre Autodromo Internacional do Algarve is a truly unique undulating circuit.

The Autodromo Internacional do Algarve is located near the city of Portimao. The philosophy behind the conception of the Algarve Motor Park project was to create a group of facilities, which by being located close to each other, would be mutually beneficial. The track is part of a purpose-built facility, including a karting track, technology park, five-star hotel, sports complex and apartments, that will be completed during this year.

The natural relief of its terrain has allowed the creation of a truly unique undulating circuit. It has been built with the aim of providing a challenging but fun track to drive on.

Home team Portugal will have the familiar face of Filipe Albuquerque in the cockpit hoping to close in on two other series regulars, Switzerland?s Neel Jani and Ireland?s Adam Carroll, who sit ahead of him in the championship standings. With only nine points separating the top three the battle is heating up as the series nears its conclusion.

The 23-year-old Albuquerque is keen to reach the top step of the podium in front of his home crowd after getting a taste for victory back in Chengdu, China at the end of 2008 and finishing on the podium in the last four events.

On his chances for the weekend, he said: ?I think I can win. It?s always my goal. We have been very strong since New Zealand and consistently been at the top at every event so there is no reason why we shouldn‘t be up there again here.

?I am definitely still in the title fight and the championship is now even more open with the confirmation of A1GP Mexico City. We still cannot predict it just being the current top three as some other team like the Netherlands can also come up.

MUMBAI: He endorsed the maximum number of brands and is also the most recalled celebrity

brand ambassador ahead even of Amitabh Bachchan. Shahrukh Khan and the Brand SRK, spells pure success and has given India global recognition with his movies. He is a sure shot businessman, his production house has the best grosser and now with IPL he is churning big money.

Star Wars continue on the cricket pitch. While Shahrukh Khan is proving his business skills Juhi Chawla his partner in production house didn?t want to stay behind either. She joined the bandwagon as his partner in the IPL team. Preity Zinta on the other hand is a strong individual who has won Asia?s sexiest woman title, a style icon and at the same time, has been received as one brave actress who stood tall even when adversary awaited her. She is forever confident and is never insecure. She has put aside her image of being a conventional actress and has ventured into being a business corporate giving all the tycoons a run for their money. She is an equal owner of IPL team Punjab IX.

If one is a born dancer, then the other is an expert action master, a hard core daredevil. Akshay Kumar and Hrithik Roshan, the two superstars of the industry have always been into war zone. They both are brand ambassadors of soft drink companies now and are both facing each other in the forthcoming IPL as Hrithik Roshan is endorsing the ?Mumbai Indian? and Akki is selected as the face for Delhi Daredevils from the league. This week?s episode of Superstar Superlives will tell you who the best endorser among them is.

IPL has brought Bollywood stars and cricketers together in a way that has never been experienced before. All the brand endorsers and mascots of Bollywood are ready for big business. Among all the cheer and fun there are definite undercurrents and cold wars. To know more tune into the special episode of Superstars Superlives ?Star Wars? this April 13-17, Monday-Friday, 8.30pm only on ZoOm.