News Broadcasting
NDTV secures Rs 5.85 billion FIPB clearance for entertainment, lifestyle channels
NEW DELHI: News major NDTV’s plans to enter the broadcast entertainment arena has just moved up a gear. The finance ministry has approved foreign investment of Rs 5.85 billion by NDTV Networks UK in wholly owned subsidiary companies – NDTV Imagine and NDTV Lifestyle.
The approvals for foreign direct investment in the two companies are for the upcoming launch of NDTV’s Hindi general entertainment and lifestyle channels.
It was Indiantelevision.com that reported that NDTV Group had floated Networks Plc, UK, which would play a big role in bringing in investments for the entertainment and other non news channels.
The Rs 5.85 billion funding that NDTV has secured corroborates an earlier media report that had said that $106 million would be invested into NDTV Imagine while $25.23 million would be pumped into NDTV Lifestyle, a channel dedicated to travel, food, fashion, shopping and health and wellness.
The Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) cleared NDTV’s FDI application in its meeting held on 14 February.
NDTV Networks will be driving the group’s new business initiatives worldwide comprising entertainment, lifestyle, convergence, outsourcing, new channels set up in different countries and software/technology development.
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:Â 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.
