Reality show ‘Egiye Bangla’ to go on air on December 6

From a mechanism to clean river surfaces to a mobile app for ordering lip-smacking home-cooked food and a mobile app for tailor-made Dokra and other handicrafts – a variety of innovative ideas will be contesting for the top prize as 40 entrepreneurs across the state will appear in a novel TV reality show conceived by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and anchored by Sourav Ganguly and Jisshu Sengupta.

The first episode of the show, titled Egiye Bangla, and funded by the state government, will be aired on December 6. Nine episodes, including the grand finale, will be aired on a private TV channel every Sunday evening. This is the first business reality show in the country to be funded by any government.

The first phase of the reality show will feature 40 entrepreneurs in eight episodes. A panel of three judges – Bandhan Bank founder Chandra Sekhar Ghosh, restaurateur Anjan Chatterjee and IIM Calcutta professor Ashok Banerjee – will chose a winner from every episode.

The eight winners will appear in the grand finale. The champion, besides other assistance, would get equity funding worth nearly Rs 1 crore from the state government’s venture capital fund.

Among the 40 contestants are a group of young passouts from Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology, Shibpur. They have invented a mechanism to clean the surface of rivers and other water bodies, using inflatable technology. In this mechanism, a balloon sucks in the garbage on river surface.

Another young man from Bankura’s Bikna village, known for the Dokra craft, has come up with an app that helps Dokra craftsmen to improve on their designs and deliver tailor-made products for customers who can connect with the artisans through the app. He is also consulting professors at IIT Kharagpur to make the Dokra crafts lead-free. The crafts do not get orders from abroad only because it contains lead.

A group of Kolkata-based youths have come up with a mobile app to connect homemakers and foodies who want to avoid sinful street food or items from restaurants. In this app, a collection of homemakers will announce what they will cook for the day and for how many individuals. The food will be delivered to the customer’s doorstep by those who have launched the app.

Another young man in the show will offer to install solar panels at your home/ office with the promise of realising the cost of solar panels and installation over a period of time. He will also promise that the monthly bill will be less than the current power bills.