PESHAWAR, Jan 8: A Pushto television channel, Abaseen, has not been launched owing to a delay on the part of the federal government, it is learnt. “Authorities had planned to launch the channel from Peshawar on Aug 14 last year. Only a go-ahead from the top brass is awaited, but some elements are hampering the plan,” sources said.

They said several meetings at the top level had approved the plan to launch the channel one year back.

They said a new studio and master control room had been established for the channel. Last month, PTV, Peshawar centre, also got the up-linking facility costing millions of rupees that enabled the 13 boosters across the NWFP and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas to ensure that transmission from the channel reached the entire area.

Following the decision to launch the channel last year, a proposal prepared by the Peshawar centre in 10 days was very well received by the federal government and it had asked other centres to replicate it for launching their local languages’ channels.

The sources said the incumbent general manager had been transferred from Islamabad in February last year to Peshawar for expediting the preparations for the channel. “However, it appears that the plan has been put in the cold storage,” said the sources.

The channel, the sources said, would cost Rs350 million but it could generate a higher revenue.

The centre has already prepared programmes for four months in advance for the channel.

A feasibility report sent to the PTV headquarters last year had requested that the approval of programmes should be decentralised. According to the initial plan, 42 programmes would be aired every week. The sources said that according to the proposal, the channel was supposed to air new programmes for six hours daily, which would be repeated four times to ensure 24-hour transmission.

It had asked the headquarters to create 182 posts for the channel.

“The government is not only losing revenue because of the delay but it has also failed to convey its policy regarding the war on terrorism and militancy in Fata,” the sources said.

They said the government had planned to launch four channels in regional languages but so far only one of them had been launched from Quetta.

“The centre has long completed preparations to launch the channel,” the sources said.

The Peshawar centre has now begun telecasting the programmes prepared for the Abaseen channel from the PTV1. Some of them carry the logo of Abaseen.