When too much airtime can be bad

The IMI has kicked off a Sound of Silence drive in Maharashtra to tackle issues like radio revolution and its effect on sales of music records, piracy excise duty on CDs, sales tax on cassettes and royalty regulations among others.

However, the exact details of how a track would be edited was still being negotiated, IMI members said. Industry sources confirmed that 90-second radio edits or pre-release tracks were being planned by IMI.

‘‘The issue as far as radio is concerned is the number of times a song is played and we’re trying to work around that figure,’’ said Abhik Mitra, MD, SaRe GaMa. However, this decision hasn’t gone down well with private radio stations. Rajesh Tahil, head of GO FM said: ‘‘World over, the radio industry is considered as a brilliant promotion tool for music. I think the music industry should look within before blaming us.’’

He added, ‘‘If we play radio edits then music companies should be paying us because it’s like playing spots (advertisements) for them.’’ While Tahil terms the idea of radio edits as ‘‘atrocious’’ and ‘‘unthinkable’’, Aditya Patwardhan, head of RED FM, feels differently. He says: ‘‘I think radio edits are a welcome move provided they are three to three-and-a-half minutes in duration as practiced abroad.’’