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Public Broadcaster Doordarshan has availed free offline service that will allow its users to watch DD channels on the smartphone without any internet connection.
In a statement, the broadcaster said that the Digital Terrestrial Television services of Doordarshan is available since February 25 in 16 cities including the four metros. The services are available in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Guwahati, Patna, Ranchi, Cuttack, Lucknow, Jalandhar, Raipur, Indore, Aurangabad, Bhopal, Bangalore, and Ahmedabad.
According to a report by Counterpoint Research, India has become the second-biggest smartphone market in terms of active unique smartphone users, crossing 220 Mn users. The younger generation usually flips to apps like Spuul, Hotstar, YuppTV etc or YouTube for digital entertainment. Recently in January 2016, Netflix also entered India.
Doordarshan had been contemplating the launch since last year as it believes that unlike other digitised channels that work on internet, there are many Indians who depend upon free channels like Doordarshan to watch TV. Hence, Prasar Bharati had ideated to create at least 20 free-to-air channels including DD channels to expand its reach to people and youngsters, who spend most of their time on their smartphones.
How To Avail The Service?
- Although the service is free of cost, the users first need to download, Tv-On-Go Doordarshan app, an Android app, for the dongle to catch signals from DD.
- Secondly, in order to ward off the need of Internet connection, Prasar Bharati has used DVB T2 (Digital Video Broadcasting Terrestrial Two) technology, a digital video broadcasting device. It has a high data capacity of upto 40 mbps, and can be simply plugged into an on-the-go (OTG) enabled smartphones and tablets to view channels. It also has an option of Wi-Fi routers, which can be plugged at home to enjoy OTG service from DD. If placed near the window, it can transmit signal to a radius of 20 mts from it.
- Users can buy the dongle and Wi-Fi devices can be purchased from Flipkart, Ebay and Snapdeal.
- Besides, some of the TV sets like that of Sony, LG, Panasonic, Samsung, etc. have built-in DVB-T2 tuner called Integrated Digital TV (iDTV), which can be used as a dongle for watching DD Channels.
Presently, channels like DD National, DD News, DD Bharati, DD Sports, DD Regional/DD Kisan are being broadcasted. The broadcaster plans to add more channels and expand to more cities based on consumer’s feedback.
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