The market was expecting good results but this good? The Jeetendra Kapoor family‘s Balaji Telefilms posted a net profit of Rs 290.15 million for FY 2001-02 as compared to Rs 43.55 million in FY 2000-01 in its financial results announced today. That is a massive 666.25 per cent net profit jump over last year.

Net profit for the quarter ended 31 March 2002 was Rs 89.3 million compared to a net loss of Rs 21 million for the corresponding period last fiscal.

Total income has increased from Rs 147.7 million in the March quarter 2001 to Rs 348.7 million for the corresponding quarter in 2002 while total income for the year has increased from Rs 496.7 million in FY 2000-01 to Rs 1131 million for FY 2001-02.

The board has recommended final dividend of 50 per cent (Rs 5 per share) for the year ended 31 March 2002 (which includes 25 per cent [Rs 2.50 per share] interim dividend declared and paid during the year) on the paid-up equity share capital of the company, subject to the approval of shareholders at the ensuing annual general meeting.

The figures for the three months ended 31 March 2002 are not comparable with the corresponding quarter of the previous year due to change in the accounting policy, wherein the entire cost of production of serials in respect of which the company retains intellectual property rights (IPRs), was written off in the last quarter of the previous year, a company release states. The company continues to write off the entire cost of production of serials in the current year.

Following yesterday‘s announcement made by B4U Networks that it had secured the terrestrial telecast rights for the FIFA soccer World Cup from Taj Sports, the promoter company of sports channel Ten Sports, there has been a clarification issued.

Peter Hutton, V-P Programming, Ten Sports, said today: "It would be incorrect to say that B4U has the terrestrial rights to the World Cup. Our discussions with them are limited to the airtime sales of highlights being shown after 11 pm on Doordarshan and there is no deal as yet with Doordarshan to show such highlights."

When contacted Debashish Dey, chief distribution officer, B4U, stated that "we have acquired the rights for a six-hour deferred terrestrial telecast on Doordarshan of four matches and the opening and closing ceremonies." The matches that will be shown in their entirety are the opening match, the two semi-finals and the finals. For the other 60 matches that will be played during the tournament, one-hour highlight capsules would be aired at 11 pm, Dey said. "In all probability we will be buying 11-12 pm slots on DD and telecasting the highlights," he added.

Spurred by stupendous success of its Playwin Lottery, Subhash Chandra‘s Essel group is moving its golden goose to fresh pastures.
A variant of Playwin‘s Super Lotto which is under the Sikkim state lottery, will be introduced in the next two months with the state lotteries of the governments of Maharashtra and Karnataka. The coming week will also see corporate tie-ups and co-branding exercises by Playwin, says Playwin marketing vice-president Sanjay Yashroi.

The company is also planning to double the number of its terminals from the present 700 in the next two to three months, says Yashroi. While Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala are the strongest states in terms of response to Super Lotto, it‘s the five north-eastern states including Mizoram, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh which are still to catch on, he says. Sikkim itself has only 10 terminals, with eight located in Gangtok itself.

Response to the online lottery has registered an increase of 150 per cent over the base in the nine weeks since it started, says Yashroi. While the first draw drew three million responses, the latest one on 23 May drew 7.5 million responses.

The latest winner of the jackpot of Rs 86.1 million announced yesterday, remains a mystery though. Yashroi claims that the winner is either still unaware of the results or is too overawed to react to the news and hence has not come forward to claim the booty. The online system enables the company to track the winning ticket to the city in which it was sold instantly, but Playwin is not divulging the details till the winner volunteers to collect his prize, Yashroi said.