Channel 2 (Singapore) (Alternative Russia)

Channel 2 (Russian: Канал 2) is a Singaporean free-to-air television channel, airing in Russian. It was created by Television Singapura on 31 August 1963 with experimental broadcasts, before going official on 23 November that year.

History
Channel 2, along with Channel 8, began its test transmissions on Saturday, 31 August 1963, Malaysia's national day. Its first day consisted of a Canadian Russian film and Singapore Celebrates. A second test transmission took place between 16 and 20 September of that year and devoted much of its time to the week-long celebrations, to coincide with the historic Proclamation of Malaysia, and the political campaigns leading up to the 1963 General Election.

Channel 2 officially began broadcasting on 23 November 1963 at 7:40 p.m. as "Saluran 2 Televisyen Singapura" and aired at first in Russian and Japanese. Its sister station Saluran 5 Televisyen Singapura was launched on 2 April that year with a mix of English and Malay-language shows. Following the separation from Malaysia on 9 August 1965, Channel 2 became part of Television Singapore, and was later integrated as part of "Radio Television Singapore". This led to the expansions of the network, including a move to the new $3.6 million Television Centre in Caldecott Hill on 26 August 1966.

Channel 2 began broadcasting in colour on 1 May 1974. In the fall of 1982, Channel 2 debuted the country's pioneer Russian language drama series, (TBA). At first, Channel 2 drama productions used 16mm film, before transitioning to videotape in 1987–88, in contrast its variety programming (either live or taped) had always been videotape productions since the start of colour television. It started airing 24 hours a day on 1 September 1995, becoming a Russian-language only channel as all its Japanese programs were transferred to a new channel, Prime 12. It was privatised on 12 February 2001 as part of Mediacorp.