AAGMAAL TV
IST

Mumbai desk · India TV listings

The television broadcast guide India actually uses.

AagMaal TV is a Mumbai-based editorial EPG for DTH, digital cable and free-to-air homes. Every listing on this page is in Indian Standard Time.

Tonight’s IST grid Find a channel number
ISTSingle national time zone, no DST
9TRAI EPG genres on every legal platform
5+National DTH brands plus local cable MSOs
22Scheduled Indian languages on linear TV

Direct answer

What is an Indian television broadcast guide?

An Indian television broadcast guide — also called an electronic programme guide or EPG — is the on-screen and online listing of what each linear channel is showing, in Indian Standard Time, grouped by the genre the broadcaster declared to TRAI.

AagMaal TV publishes that map in English for households on Tata Play, Airtel Digital TV, Dish TV, d2h, Sun Direct, HITS, IPTV, digital cable and DD Free Dish. We do not sell a set-top box. We explain how the box you already own is organised.

Channel names are national. Channel numbers are not. Your logical channel number (LCN) is chosen by your distributor, which is why Star Plus can sit on one number in Pune and another in Kochi. The reliable way to search is brand + genre + language, then save the LCN as a favourite.

This page was written by Meera Iyer, broadcast editor at AagMaal TV Media Private Limited, Goregaon East, Mumbai, and last updated on 4 September 2026.

Regulation, made usable

Nine TRAI genres. That is the spine of every Indian EPG.

Under TRAI interconnection and quality-of-service rules, every broadcaster declares one genre, and every distributor must place same-genre channels together, with each channel appearing once. If your guide feels random, the box is out of compliance — not the channel.

GEC

General Entertainment

Star Plus, Colors, Zee TV, Sony SAB, plus regional GECs such as Sun TV, Star Maa, Asianet, Star Pravah and Zee Bangla. This is where prime-time fiction lives.

Movies

Movies

Star Gold, Sony MAX, Zee Cinema and English movie feeds. Hindi film channels still dominate Friday and Sunday nights on pay-TV.

News

News & current affairs

Aaj Tak, NDTV 24x7, India Today, Republic and a long tail of Hindi, English and state-language news channels. Night bulletins cluster after 22:00 IST.

Sports

Sports

Star Sports and Sony Sports hold most cricket, football and tennis rights on linear TV. When a match overruns, it swallows the rest of the remote.

Kids

Kids

Pogo, Cartoon Network, Hungama and Nick sit in a consecutive kids block. After-school (16:00–19:00 IST) is their peak, not prime time.

Music

Music

Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Punjabi music feeds. Useful as a “holding channel” between GEC episodes.

Info

Infotainment

Factual, travel and science brands. Often mixed with English entertainment in smaller DTH packs.

Faith

Devotional

A consecutive spiritual block, typically stronger in early morning IST than at 21:00.

Misc

Miscellaneous

The TRAI remainder bin: shopping, teleshopping, niche and unclassified feeds. Scroll past it when you are hunting GEC.

Tonight · editorial sample

A typical Friday evening in Indian Standard Time

This grid is an editorial illustration of how a Friday night is usually stacked on national pay-TV. Exact episode titles move with the broadcaster; the shape of the evening does not. Last reviewed 4 September 2026, 14:00 IST.

IST Hindi GEC Movies Sports / News South GEC
Early-evening soaps and repeats Matinee hangover / catalogue film Evening news belts begin Regional fiction warm-up
Access prime: family drama Hindi film premiere window opens Pre-match or market wrap Tamil / Telugu / Malayalam lead-in
Comedy + core fiction Weekend film, first hour Live cricket if scheduled Flagship regional soaps
Peak fiction hour Film continues Live sport or debate Peak South GEC
Late fiction / reality Second film or end credits Night bulletins Late regional wrap

How the signal reaches the set

Four pipes, one remote. Know which pipe you are on.

Paid DTH

Tata Play, Airtel Digital TV, Dish TV, d2h and Sun Direct. You pick a-la-carte channels or a bouquet. The distributor may discount the broadcaster’s MRP but cannot charge more than MRP. Your LCN is unique to that operator.

Digital cable & HITS

A local multi-system operator, or a HITS player such as NXT Digital, feeds the building. Genre grouping still applies. Support is local; channel maps change when the MSO renegotiates a bouquet.

DD Free Dish

Prasar Bharati’s free-to-air DTH platform. The channel list is set by auction and public-service carriage, not by a monthly pack. Capacity has grown into a large FTA bouquet plus educational and radio feeds. It is not interchangeable with a paid Tata Play or Airtel lineup.

OTT is not this guide

JioCinema, Netflix, Amazon MX Player and broadcaster apps are on-demand. They do not use TRAI LCN maps. If you only stream, you still use this page to understand what linear India is broadcasting — useful for news, cricket and family GEC that still premieres on TV.

Language belts

India does not have one TV market. It has stacked language markets.

Hindi GEC still sets the national advertising clock, but the remote in Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkata or Pune is a different product. Search AagMaal TV by language first, genre second.

Hindi

Hindi heartland GEC, movies and news. Prime time 20:00–22:30 IST is the money belt.

English

News, movies and infotainment. Smaller linear share; stronger in metros and hotel packs.

Tamil

Sun TV and competing GECs. Afternoon and 19:00–22:00 IST fiction are the local prime.

Telugu

Star Maa, ETV and peers. Film and GEC both travel well on DTH into the Gulf as well as Andhra and Telangana.

Malayalam

Asianet and Malayalam news. Dense cable + DTH mix; Gulf diaspora viewing is a real overlay.

Kannada

Colors Kannada and Udaya-side GECs. Pricing on some South HD feeds has been at the top of 2026 a-la-carte bands.

Marathi

Star Pravah, Zee Marathi, Colors Marathi. Mumbai and Maharashtra prime tracks Hindi by about 30–45 minutes.

Bengali

Zee Bangla, Star Jalsha, Colors Bangla. Strong 18:00–22:00 IST fiction habit.

Directory

Popular Indian channels, grouped the way TRAI intends.

Numbers below are not LCNs. They are directory IDs on this page. Punch the brand name into your box guide to get the operator-specific number.

GEC · Hindi

Star Plus

Flagship Hindi general entertainment. The 20:00–22:00 IST fiction block is still the reference prime-time clock for much of north and west India.

GEC · Hindi

Colors

Hindi GEC with reality and fiction. Often paired with Star Plus in the same JioStar distribution conversation for 2026 packs.

GEC · Hindi

Zee TV

Hindi general entertainment from ZEEL. Check a-la-carte versus bouquet: Hindi packs and All-in-One packs price differently each RIO cycle.

GEC · Hindi

Sony SAB

Comedy-leaning Hindi GEC. A frequent “second screen in the house” during the 20:00 IST hour.

Movies · Hindi

Star Gold

Hindi film channel. Friday and Sunday nights are the catalogue and festival windows.

Movies · Hindi

Sony MAX

Hindi movies, often the cricket-adjacent movie brand in the Sony cluster. Confirm MAX / MAX 2 / MAX 1 — they are different LCNs.

Movies · Hindi

Zee Cinema

ZEEL’s core Hindi movie feed. Look beside it for Zee Bollywood and Zee Anmol Cinema on value packs.

News · Hindi

Aaj Tak

Hindi news. Evening and 22:00 IST belts are the appointment slots; the rest is rolling coverage.

News · English

NDTV 24x7

English news. Metro packs and hotel lineups carry it even when Hindi news dominates the household remote.

Sports

Star Sports 1

Live sport. When cricket is on, this channel becomes the de facto prime-time GEC for that night — plan around it.

Sports

Sony Sports Ten 1

Sony’s sports spine. Rights rotate by year; always read tonight’s event title in the EPG, not the channel brand alone.

Kids

Pogo

Kids entertainment. Peak is after school, not 21:00 IST. Park it in Favourites if there is a child in the house.

Kids

Cartoon Network

Kids / animation. Usually sitting in the same consecutive kids genre block as Pogo and Hungama.

GEC · Tamil

Sun TV

Tamil flagship GEC. If you are on Sun Direct, this is often easier to find than on a Hindi-first national DTH map.

GEC · Telugu

Star Maa

Telugu general entertainment. Regional HD a-la-carte pricing sat at the upper end of JioStar’s 2026 RIO band.

GEC · Malayalam

Asianet

Malayalam GEC. Same 2026 pricing note as other premium South HD feeds — check SD versus HD before you add both.

GEC · Marathi

Star Pravah

Marathi GEC. In Mumbai it often shares the evening with Hindi GEC rather than replacing it.

GEC · Bengali

Zee Bangla

Bengali general entertainment. Fiction from 18:00 IST is the local habit; Hindi prime is a second remote, not the first.

How-to

Find any channel on an Indian set-top box in four minutes.

You do not need AagMaal TV open while you do this. You need the Guide button and the genre list TRAI already forced onto the box.

Open the guide

Press Guide or EPG. Every legal distributor must list all channels it carries.

Jump to the genre

Go to General Entertainment, Movies, News and Current Affairs, Sports, Kids, Music, Infotainment, Devotional or Miscellaneous.

Read the LCN

The number beside the logo is yours alone for that operator. It will not match a neighbour on another DTH brand.

Check language and HD

Tamil versus Hindi, SD versus HD. HD is often a nearby block, not the same number.

Save a favourite

Store the LCN. That is the only number that matters on your remote.

Prime time

Indian TV prime time is 19:00–23:00 IST. The spike is 20:00–22:30.

India runs on a single time zone. There is no spring-forward. A 21:00 IST soap is 21:00 IST in Guwahati and in Ahmedabad. That is why national GEC still events the country on one clock, even when the language on screen is not Hindi.

Sports rights punch a hole in that clock. A weekday IPL or an India international can move the household from Star Plus to Star Sports without anyone thinking of it as “changing genre.” Plan Friday nights as GEC-or-cricket, not GEC-and-cricket.

Kids peak earlier. Devotional peaks at dawn. News has a morning showbelt and a 21:00–23:00 debate belt. If you treat the whole box as one prime time, you will keep missing the show you actually wanted.

Masthead

An Indian newsroom for the programme guide.

AagMaal TV Media Private Limited is a Mumbai publisher. We write in English for an India audience (en-IN). We cite TRAI genre rules, DTH operator maps and broadcaster distribution offers. Sample grids are labelled as editorial illustrations when they are not a live ingested EPG.

We do not take carriage fees to hide a channel. We do not pretend an LCN is universal. We do not mix OTT catalogues into linear listings without saying so.

Editor: Meera Iyer. Registered office: Plot 18, Film City Road, Goregaon East, Mumbai, Maharashtra 400063, India. Phone +91 22 6964 1100. Email [email protected].

FAQ

Questions Indian viewers ask before they touch the remote.

What is AagMaal TV?

AagMaal TV is an India-based editorial television broadcast guide published from Mumbai at aagmaaltv.in. It explains electronic programme guides, TRAI channel genres, DTH and cable listings, and prime-time viewing in Indian Standard Time. It is not a DTH operator or a streaming app.

What time is prime time on Indian television?

Indian television prime time is generally 19:00 to 23:00 IST, with the largest fiction and live-sport audiences between 20:00 and 22:30 IST. India does not use daylight saving, so these hours stay fixed through the year.

Why is a channel on a different number on my neighbour’s box?

Logical channel numbers are assigned by each distributor. Tata Play, Airtel Digital TV, Dish TV, d2h, Sun Direct and local multi-system operators each build their own LCN map. The channel brand stays the same; only the number changes.

How does TRAI require channels to appear in the EPG?

Broadcasters declare one genre. Distributors must list channels of the same genre consecutively and show each channel once. The nine TRAI genres are Devotional, General Entertainment, Infotainment, Kids, Movies, Music, News and Current Affairs, Sports and Miscellaneous.

Is DD Free Dish the same as paid DTH?

No. DD Free Dish is Prasar Bharati’s free-to-air DTH platform. Paid DTH and digital cable sell a-la-carte channels and bouquets under TRAI tariff rules, with a distributor retail price that cannot exceed the broadcaster’s MRP.

Do AagMaal TV listings use Indian Standard Time?

Yes. Every clock, grid and timestamp on AagMaal TV is Indian Standard Time (Asia/Kolkata, UTC+5:30). Convert from another zone by subtracting or adding the offset from IST.

Can I watch these channels on a phone without a set-top box?

Some broadcasters also stream on their own apps or licensed OTT services. AagMaal TV is a broadcast guide for linear television. App availability, geoblocks and subscription packs are set by each rights holder, not by this site.

Where is AagMaal TV based?

AagMaal TV Media Private Limited is headquartered in Goregaon East, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, and publishes at https://aagmaaltv.in/.

Contact

Write to the Mumbai desk.

Editorial corrections, missed genres and distribution notes: we read Hindi and English. For a missing channel, we still need your operator name and subscriber ID — we cannot retune a box from this website.

AagMaal TV Media Private Limited
Plot 18, Film City Road, Goregaon East
Mumbai, Maharashtra 400063, India
+91 22 6964 1100
[email protected] · [email protected]

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