Improving the presentation qualities of Doordarshan and All India Radio and filling up of key vacancies are the top priorities of the new Prasar Bharati CEO, Mr Jawhar Sircar, who assumed office today.

Mr Sircar, who was Secretary, Ministry of Culture, before joining the Prasar Bharati, spoke about his priorities while interacting with presspersons here.

He said though the news content and reach of Doordarshan and AIR were remarkable, the presentation standards were not up to the mark.

"Presentation is an area where we need to give attention ....," he said, adding, "We are high on content and could improve upon presentation of content."

Mr Sircar said he needed time to understand why presentation was not up to competitive standards.

Another area he would pay attention to was staff-related issues, he said, and asked his colleagues to move ahead in a positive direction

"My only appeal to my colleagues is that we have gone through a tough phase and now it is time to look positively," he said.

Referring to unfilled posts, he said, "I have been told that there are nearly 14,000 vacancies if you take the original sanction" and added that a task force had re-evaluated the number of critical posts to be filled up immediately.

Mr Sircar succeeds Mr B. S. Lalli, whose tenure ended in the wake of allegations of irregularities. In the interim period, Mr Rajiv Takru, Additional Secretary in the I and B Ministry, was holding additional charge. (Business Line 22/02)

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Jaisakthivel, ADXC, India