It’s time for lovers of Marathi cinema to rejoice. Or, at least, those who love Marathi cinema and happen to subscribe to Tata Sky as well. The DTH service has announced the launch of Tata Sky Marathi Cinema, a VOD (video on demand), ad-free service that claims to offer the finest in Marathi movies, songs, and plays.
It is undeniable that Marathi cinema in recent years – led by fine films such as Sairat, Vihir, Shala, Killa et al – has seen renewed interest, not just from Marathi speakers but across the country. And Tata Sky’s new platform appears to be just what the doctor ordered for those keen to discover more gems.
The service has been launched in partnership with Shemaroo, and will offer subscribers access to, “more than 120 films, 500 songs and the best in Marathi theatre”. Tata Sky says subscribers can watch up to three movies a day. In addition, they can also access other ad-free content such comedy special and trailers. What’s more, Tata Sky Marathi Cinema promises to showcase not just past masterpieces but also a world television premiere every Sunday.
To be fair, the service has been a while coming. Regional cinema, after all, is witnessing considerable popularity. Tata Sky Marathi Cinema is the third entrant to the bouquet of regional cinema services that includes Tata Sky Bangla Cinema and Tata Sky Punjab De Rang. Arun Unni, Chief Content Officer at Tata Sky, says that these channels were launched about a year ago to a great response. Marathi was always on the cards but, “to build a service with the right partner and right content, takes some time and effort”, he says.
What’s more interesting is how Tata Sky is stepping into the content aggregator space, by making cinema available on demand to subscribers. Moreover, all of it is available ad-free. The similarity with increasingly popular online streaming services, such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Hotstar, is striking. Of course, the differences matter too. While Netflix and its ilk rely on fast broadband connections, Tata Sky delivers a satellite-signal based service to 17 million subscribers in 1.5 lakh towns. On the other hand, it can only offer a fixed-place service, unlike streaming, on-the-go services.
Way forward
Even more interesting is its take on television. At its core, Tata Sky remains a DTH service provider, merely a mediator born during the golden age of television – a step up from cable television, and many steps up from the wonky antennas that used to dot Indian homes in the 80s and 90s. Now, instead of merely owning the end customer and paying licensing fees to various channels, Tata Sky wants to provide its own content as well. The service provider wants to offer a significantly better value proposition – by doing away with the pesky business of television programming schedules and the perpetual nuisance of films and shows skewered by numerous ad breaks.
Is this the future of television then? Unni is non-committal. For him, however, the idea is to give subscribers the best of both worlds – regular television channels as well as VOD services. “Sometimes certain value propositions may not make sense for broadcasters who have to evaluate their investment from both an advertising and subscription perspective. We try and fill unfulfilled need gaps that we believe the customer will value. It is an ad-free film and theatre product that subscribers can enjoy, where the objective is not to generate ad-friendly ratings,” says Unni.
The content officer does not see on-demand services on Tata Sky as a direct competitor to online streaming services. He is convinced that it’s not a zero sum game. “We believe that the all of these services have their place in the ecosystem and they cater to different segments of consumers. Our objective is not to compete with various content partners but to put a holistic offering together which could include third party services as well as our own. Unlike trends that you may see in any other country, no one format of content delivery will wipe out the other. Rather, they will co-exist and complement each other”, he says.
Tata Sky Marathi Cinema will showcase latest hits such as Paisa Paisa (2016), Cindrella (2015), Bus Stop (2017), Katti Batti (2015) and many others. The service will also feature popular plays such as Lahanpan Dega Deva , Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy , Lageraho Rajabhaiya , Usna Navra and Kanekari . The service requires a monthly subscription fee of ₹30.
