NEW DELHI: Eleven All India Radio Stations and 164 private FM radio stations are expected to go on air by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, Information and Broadcasting ministry sources said pre-qualification bids had been invited from private companies for 78 vacant FM channels of class ?‹?“C and ?‹?“D cities through a notification on 8 June.

After the new policy of expansion of FM broadcasting through private operators had been notified on 13 July 2005, 337 channels in 91 cities including 217 channels of class-C and class-D cities were put on bid. Out of these, agreements were signed with successful bidders for 139 channels in 57 cities.

At present, a total of 263 FM channels include 161 of All India Radio and 102 privately owned channels are operational. These include 21 operationalised under the Phase-1 scheme.

Of the private FM radio channels expected to come up by the end of the year, 27 are in Maharashtra; 17 in Kerala; 14 in Tamil Nadu; 12 in Rajasthan; 10 each in Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh; nine each in Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh; eight each in Karnataka and West Bengal; seven each in Punjab and Jharkhand; six in Chattisgarh; three each in Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Puducherry; two each in Orissa, Meghalaya and Assam; and one each in Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Tripura, Bihar and Daman and Diu.

The All India Radio stations are coming up in eight states by the end of the year. Of these, three will come up Jammu and Kashmir (Diskit, Nyoma and Padum), and two in Orissa (Rairangpur and Soro). The others are Macherla (Andhra Pradesh), Oras (Maharashtra), Churachandpur (Manipur), Dungarpur (Rajasthan), Dharmapuri (Tamil Nadu), and Dharmanagar (Tripura).