New Delhi, Aug. 10 (PTI): Mahua Media Private Limited, an associate company of the film distribution company, Century Communication, launched its first Bhojpuri entertainment channel — Mahua.

The channel that would targeted the 6 crore Bhojpuri-speaking people in Bihar, Utter Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and migrants in the NCR region was launched by railway minister Lalu Prasad today.

The channel’s media chairman and managing director P.K. Tiwari told reporters that the group has invested around Rs 80 crore in the venture.

“There is a demand of Bhojpuri content across our country and across countries such as Mauritius, Surinam, Fiji, and Guinea that we will try to meet,” Tiwari said.

He added that the group would soon start a bouquet of Bhojpuri channels including a news channel, a music channel and film channel.

For the proposed film channel, the company has already bagged rights of 175 films and is in process of acquiring the rights of 25 more. The channel that would start from August 11 has roped in Bollywood director Prakash Jha to produce a serial called Bahubali. For now, the channel would telecast films, news, daily soaps, songs and food and travel-related programmes. Actors Manoj Vajpayee, T.R. Shetty and Bhagyashree, lyrics writer Sameer, singers Udit Narayan and Shewta Tiwari were present at the launch.