Fame Gurukul renamed; shifted to SAB TV

Sony TV’s singing talent show ‘Fame Gurukul’ is returning in November in a new avatar, along with a channel hop.

When the show returns, it will be known as ‘Fame X’ and will be moved from flagship channel Sony Entertainment Television Asia to sister station SAB TV.

The change of name to ‘Fame X’ has been undertaken simply to refer to the indefinable something that makes for star quality, according to SAB TV senior vice president and business head Vikas Bhal.

Another change in the new series will be that the contestants will not be undergoing any makeover. This time around, the channel has decided to focus more on the singing than the presentation of the individual.

Among the other changes being rung into ‘Fame X’ is that there will be only one winner rather than the jodi (couple) concept that was seen earlier. A big thing for the ‘Fame X’ winner will be that he/she gets the honour of creating a song and singing for the cricket World Cup that will be held in the West Indies in March 2007.

Bahl concludes that the channel has yet to come to a decision on the jury panel as well as the host of the show. SET’s ‘Fame Gurukul had lyricist Javed Akhtar, singer KK and musician Shankar Mahadevan as the panel judges while singer Ila Arun was the strict headmistress of the music academy.

The programme will air on a daily basis. This series will be spread across 13 weeks.

With the series being telecast on SAB TV in India, it is not yet clear whether Sony Entertainment Television Asia UK will carry the show. SAB TV is looking at launching on Sky Digital towards the latter part of this year.