six nationwide channels. Radio services Currently, SLBC's domestic FM network broadcasts 6 radio stations on a nationwide basis, which are: Sinhala Swadeshiya Sevaya' (Sinhala National Service) Tamil National Service English Service City FM (Sinhala) Velenda Sevaya' (Sinhala Commercial Service) Thendral (Tamil Commercial Service) Hindi service Radio Ceylon had a Hindi service that was launched in the early 1950s. Millions of rupees in terms of advertising revenue came from India through the efforts of Dan Molina, Frank Courtney, and S. Hariharan (A leading director of the Malayalam cinema industry. The three operated Radio Advertising Services as the advertising agents of Radio Ceylon. The station employed some of the most popular Indian announcers who played a vital role in establishing Radio Ceylon as the 'King of the airwaves' in South Asia, among them, the Ganjwar sisters, Vimla and Kamini, Vijay Kishore Dubey, Gopal Sharma, Hasan Razvi, Kumar and Manohar Mahajan, Sunil Dutt (who went on to become a film star in Bollywood), Ameen Sayani and elder brother Hamid Sayani, though not hired by Radio Ceylon became popular by using Radio Ceylon for broadcasting programs like "Binaca Geetmala" (first broadcast in 1952) and "Lipton Ke Sitaare." Its most popular features were film songs. While the golden age of Hindi-language film music was in the 1950s and 1960s, the station popularised movie songs, including the ones from Asha Bhosle, Lata Mangeshkar, K.L. Saigal, Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Mohammed Rafi, S. Janaki and others. The radio station took advantage of the situation as Bollywood film music was banned by All India Radio and other Indian radio stations at the time. This led to increased listenership for radio programmes such as Binaca Geetmala. The Binaca Hit Parade was presented by Greg Roskowski, it was a countdown of English pop music beamed on the Commercial Service and the All Asia Service. Having heard the programme, the audience flooded the station with letters requesting a countdown of Hindi-language filmi songs and the idea of Binaca Geetmala was born. Radio Ceylon also popularised English songs of Indian popular musicians - they went on to score huge hits, among them Uma Pocha (Bombay Meri Hai), Usha Uthup who has the rare distinction of singing Sri Lankan baila songs with ease and the Anglo-Indian star, Ernest Ignatius (who went on to be a success in Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber's 'Bombay Dreams' in London) had a massive hit, I married a female wrestler,