t is hard to imagine that television as we know it is just 10 years old. True, the coming of both colour TV sets and cable is about 20 years old. And yes, cable penetration, especially in Mumbai and some of the other metros, grew on the back of pirated Indian films throughout the '80s. But the only channel back then was Doordarshan and while its unchallenged reach was absolutely great for FMCG brands - Nirma would not have become what it has but for DD - segmentation was hardly even understood as a concept.

True, satellite channels came into India in the wake of the Iraq war of 1991. It is also true that Zee launched and caused a sensation in 1992 with its first Hindi telecast. However, it was only in 1995 that Sony and a host of other satellite channels got into the act to give us a taste of the variety that we now take for granted. That is why one could say that television as we know it is only about 10 years old.... more