News Broadcasting
CNN-IBN, Thums Up and Being Human presents VEER Season 2
MUMBAI: In an effort to unleash the inner potential of people with disabilities and provide them the best employment opportunities, CNN-IBN is back with its one-of-its-kind initiative ‘VEER Season 2’ in partnership with Thums Up, Being Human and American India Foundation. The show aspires to exhort and educate the citizens of India to play the role of an enabler and make people with disability discern their true potential.
Started from 24th September 2015, VEER Season 2 is a campaign of strength and self-belief to generate awareness and advocate for inclusivity, accessibility and employability of people with disabilities (PwDs). After receiving an overwhelming response for its first season, VEER in its second edition aims to drive an amount of INR 2 crores for training 2000 PwDs.
In this phase of the campaign, CNN-IBN will also be associated with, the Indian government’s Department of Social Justice and Empowerment and Hans Foundation, an NGO operating in the area of empowering marginalised sector in disability space, to provide skill for training people with disabilities (PwDs). The government body and NGO, both will eminently work with the channel to train and employ the PwDs.
Speaking about the campaign, Mr. Radhakrishnan Nair, Managing Editor, CNN-IBN, said, “We are grateful to receive the support from Thums Up, Being Human and American India Foundation for the campaign. It is our pleasure to work on such an innovative program and we hope to receive an overwhelming response from the audience.”
Debabrata Mukherjee, Vice-President Marketing and Commercial, Coca-Cola India, said, “The Thums Up philosophy of being passionate and strong is something that drives this program. Through VEER, we want to encourage all the differently abled to unleash their potential, be strong and overcome the barriers they face. We are happy with the achievements of the program in its first year and are excited about the milestones being set for the second phase, where our endeavour will be to accelerate the pace and double the deliverables of the first year.
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI: Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
