Important Activities


The first entry of Doordarshan into the state of Orissa was during September,1973 with functioning of a Base Production Centre (BPC) at Cuttack. The Upagraha Doordarshan Kendra (UDK) at Cuttack came into existence in August,1974 to feed programmes for Satellite Instructional Television Experiment(SITE) which started on 01.08.1975 and ended on 31.07.1976.

During SITE, the Kendra originated Oriya language programmes and also contributed programmes for Hindi speaking rural viewers of Madhya Pradesh. Nearly 600 Community TV sets (Direct Reception Sets – DRS) were installed in three districts of Orissa namely Sambalpur, Dhenkanal and Phulbani. In 1977, Indian National satellite (INSAT) system was approved by the Government of India. The INSAT transmission facility helped installation of DRS in the two districts of Orissa i.e. Bolangir and Dhenkanal.

The SITE Continuity Terrestrial Transmission began for the viewers of Sambalpur from 30th April,1978 for a duration of 1 Hr. 15 minutes and Doordarshan Kendra at Cuttack continued providing programmes produced at the BPC. The terrestrial transmission at Sambalpur was of 1 KW power covering an area of 40 KM radius.

With ASIAD, the LPT at Bhubaneswar came into operation from 19th November,1982. A High Power Transmitter was commissioned at Doordarshan Kendra, Cuttack on 10th March,1985 which relayed the programmes telecast through INSAT-B for the viewers around 80-100 KMs radius of its transmission zone.

Besides Doordarshan Kendra at Cuttack and Sambalpur, seven relay centers were commissioned by the end of August,1988 at Berhampur, Rourkela, Koraput, Bhawanipatna, Jeypore, Sundargarh and Baripada. These relay centres relayed the programmes including ASP from Delhi through INSAT-B. By the end of 1990, 15 more relay centers were commissioned.

The local transmission of Cuttack Kendra was inaugurated on 12th November,1987 and started telecasting regional Oriya programmes from 16th November,1987. Regional News Bulletin was introduced from 1st July,1988.

The regional programme up-linking facilities were made available to Orissa network from 7th September,1991 which enabled regional programme transmission by all HPTs/LPTs in the state. The new Doordarshan Complex at Bhubaneswar was commissioned on 19th November,1992 which was linked to its feeder High Power TV transmitter (10 KW) at Cuttack through microwave link for programme transmission.

The Regional Language satellite Service(RLSS) was started on 2.10.1993. The production and capsuling of programmes were done at DDK,Bhubaneswar and cassettes were sent to Pritampura, Delhi for up-linking in DD-5. Subsequently, Doordarshan set up its own Satellite Up-linking Earth Station i.e. TRACT at Doordarshan Studio Complex, Bhubaneswar. The Earth Station started up-linking Oriya Satellite Service from 15.8.1994 as DD-6.
With the advent of 21st Century, Doordarshan fulfilled the long standing demand of people of Orissa. The DD-6(RLSS) channel became the Round the Clock channel from 1st April,2001. With this, the art , culture and the rich heritage of Orissa got a major boost in publicity in National & International arena. In July,2002, DDK,Bhubaneswar fulfilled another long standing demand of people by introducing one Morning News Bulletin and added two News Headlines in its transmission at 3 PM & 5 PM. Simulcast Digital Up-linking started from the Kendra from 22nd April’2004.