August 2004

On the auspicious occasion of the 400th Year of Prakash Utsav of Guru Granth Sahib, ETC Networks Limited, today, announced that it will soon launch a dedicated 24 hours Religious channel named ETC CHANNEL KHALSA. With this announcement Sikh devotees throughout the world who are currently celebrating Prakash Utsav of Guru Granth Sahib with unprecedented zeal and enthusiasm, have got one more reason to celebrate. The Sikh universe had been demanding a dedicated 24 hours channel serving the needs of the Sikh community and propagating the message of Guru Granth Sahib throughout the world, for a long time and they would definitely welcome this development whole heartedly.

Mr. Jagjit Singh Kohli, Chief Executive Officer of ETC Networks Limited said "The tremendous response that we got for the religious segment on ETC CHANNEL PUNJABI has encouraged us to take this decision of creating a 24 hours dedicated religious channel which, besides telecasting live Gurbani from the Golden Temple, would also focus on the younger generation who needs exposure to religious teachings, as propagated by the 10 Gurus and depicted in the Guru Granth Sahib as well as the tremendous history of the Sikhs over the past five Centuries. The channel would have special programmes targeted at Sikh Youth as well as other regular programmes like Katha, Kirtan and Kavi Darbars".

Mr. Rabindra Narayan, President of ETC Channel Punjabi said "Like Christian channels do; ETC Khalsa would also help in spreading the message of the Gurus to a worldwide audience as they would now be enlightened in great detail about the worlds youngest religion which preaches a scientific way of living in harmony with nature".

Ms Rajiee M. Shinde, Vice President (Programming) revealed, In order to bring alive the greatness of the Sikhs our endeavor would be to soon create a mega serial on the lines of Ramayan and Mahabharat on ETC KHALSA about Sikh history. The Channel is expected to go on air as soon as it gets the necessary permissions from the Government.

ETC Channel Punjabi is making another offer to its viewers in form of 18 hours of live telecast of Celebrations of 400 years of Sri Guru Granth Sahebs installation from Amritsar. This is a Historic Moment when any channel will telecast an event Live for continuous 18 hours and sacrifice all the other programming along with advertisements to give the devotees a chance to watch the proceedings at Amritsar uninterrupted. This telecast will begin on September 1, 2004 at 3.30 AM in the morning, follow the proceedings throughout the day and conclude with elaborate fire works in the night.