MAM
BARC floats RFPs for new TV ratings system
MUMBAI: For long, there has been a hue and cry about the progress of the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) and the development of an alternative TV ratings system. Things finally seem to be moving now. Earlier this month, BARC chairman Punit Goenka announced the hiring of industry veteran Partho Dasgupta as its CEO.
Today, BARC has announced that it has issued the request for proposals (RFPs) asking global tech and research vendors to pitch in with their offers to revamp India‘s allegedly rickety existing TV rating system. This follows the overwhelming response it got for the request for information forms it had issued earlier.
Says Zee MD & CEO and BARC chairman Punit Goenka, MD & CEO of ZEE: “We are happy with the interest shown by global vendors of technology and research in our project. The RFPs are going out to all of them. This will be followed by discussions and evaluation of these proposals.”
Adds BARC CEO Partho Dasgupta: “This is our second step towards initiating a cutting edge measurement system which will see marriage of technology and research. The first step was the establishment survey which the TechCom (technical committee) led by Shashi Sinha and Paritosh Joshi has already initiated.”
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Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
