‘BSNL Sports Quiz’ enters Limca Book of National Records
By chennaivision at 22 July, 2009, 7:06 pm
Chennai, The famous BSNL Sports Quiz aired by National Broadcaster Doordarshan in its Podhigai Channel has entered into the Limca Book of National Records for the longest running weekly quiz show on television in India.
The live quiz being aired on all Saturdays between 2210 hrs and 2300 hrs, has captivated viewers across the globe.
Anchored by Dr Sumanth C Raman, a well known paediatrician, the quiz had completed 373 episodes on July 18 last week.
The previous record was held by Doordarshan Jaipur when it successfully hosted 270 episodes of ”Prashnottari”, a fortnightly quiz programme, hosted by Bureaucrat Mehendra Surana from July 23, 1993 to December 31, 2005.
Talking to reporters here last night, Doordarshan Chennai Head of Programmes S Meganathan and Creator of the Programmes P S Parameswaran along with Dr Sumanth, said the show was started as a four week show in June 2002 to coincide with the FIFA World Cup.
Once cricket content was added to it, the programme took off to amazing heights.
The popular show, over its seven-year course, has received calls from over 30,000 participants, around 4.5 lakh SMSs and also 2000 e-mails per show on an average.
Apart from Indian cities and remote villages, viewers from as far as Oman, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, China, Latvia and Estonia have participated in the programme, a testimony to the tremendous viewership response.
Dr Sumanth acknowledged the team-work that had gone into the production of the quiz-show, saying anchoring was the ‘easier job’ while the programming and engineering teams and the technicians handle the tougher aspects of it.
He said the programme brought to light the amazing talent that exists everywhere, right from college students, youth, women, elderly population, among others.
”We have received amazing answers ever from remote villages.
A sizeable audience are of women and retired personnel,” he added.
Doordarshan Chennai Superintending Engineer N Thyagarajan and BSNL Principal General manager Shanmugasundaram were among those who spoke on the occasion.
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