News Broadcasting
Govt. studying feasibility of open architecture for DTH
NEW DELHI: If it’s not CAS, then it has to be DTH. The government is now examining the issue of “open architecture” and whether a thing like that prevails at all or not.
According to government officials, the issue of open architecture and its standards, if available, is going to be referred to the Bureau of Indian Standards.
A senior government official admitted that though the government is likely to push ahead with open architecture – much to the chagrin of broadcasters who are insisting there is nothing of this sort and encryption technology is proprietary – it may refer the issue to BIS which is also looking into the matter of standardising the technology for set-top boxes which will be needed in case conditional access system is implemented.
The mandate for BIS would be to see if there are existing standards for open architecture and, if possible, the alternatives available.
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.
