NEW DELHI: Television entrepreneur Ekta Kapoor, who commenced her career with Itihaas on Doordarshan, is back on the national broadcaster with a family-oriented love story.
Pavitra Bandhan - Do dilon ka will be telecast from Mondays to Fridays commencing from 9 September at 8:30 pm.
Balaji Films chairman and renowned actor Jeetendra recalled at a press meet here how the pubcaster had given him support when he and his daughter Ekta first launched their programmes. He said that DD was a king at one time as it was the only one in the race, but it has gradually re-emerged as a major player with this new marketing policies and increasing revenues. 'The king is content, and not stars, and DD banks on content', he said.
Pavitra Bandhan is a journey of two strangers Aashima and Girish, who are completely opposite to each other by nature but are destined to meet. But their priorities do not change when they meet and their main concerns remain their respective families.
Deputy Director General Raj Shekhar Vyas, currently in charge of the primary channel DD I, said Ekta had commenced on DD Metro with Itihaas, but had now come on the primary channel. He claimed that the viewership of DD National was now the largest in the world with 1.25 crore viewers.
He said that the channel had acquired world rights of Pavitra Bandhan and it had also been decided that 60 per cent of the revenue from commercials will come to Doordarshan, the balance going to Balaji Films.
Vyas added that DD had now gone on a marketing binge and was also advertising in the print media and through hoardings. A sum of Rs 2 crore had gone to newspapers in recent months on advertising.
V K Jain who is in charge of public relations in Doordarshan said that DD will soon launch cross-channel publicity, and already had over 2,000 hoarding sites in different parts of the country.
Yash Tonk, who plays the male lead, said that he found working in films and television equally challenging. However, he admitted that he had a greater name in TV.
Hritu Dudhani who plays the female lead said she had also acted as a police officer in an early serial on Doordarshan, and acted in Bandhini with Balaji Films.
Others in the cast are Yamini Thakur, Shabnam Sayeed, Shailley Kaushik, Munni Jha, Shalini Arora, and Rajat Dahiya.
Mallika Dutt who has written the story and screenplay denied that Balaji series appeared to go on and on and said this series will only last as long as the viewers want it.
