News Broadcasting
Playwin to start with Maharashtra, Karnataka lottery shortly
Spurred by stupendous success of its Playwin Lottery, Subhash Chandra’s Essel group is moving its golden goose to fresh pastures.
A variant of Playwin’s Super Lotto which is under the Sikkim state lottery, will be introduced in the next two months with the state lotteries of the governments of Maharashtra and Karnataka. The coming week will also see corporate tie-ups and co-branding exercises by Playwin, says Playwin marketing vice-president Sanjay Yashroi.
The company is also planning to double the number of its terminals from the present 700 in the next two to three months, says Yashroi. While Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala are the strongest states in terms of response to Super Lotto, it’s the five north-eastern states including Mizoram, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh which are still to catch on, he says. Sikkim itself has only 10 terminals, with eight located in Gangtok itself.
Response to the online lottery has registered an increase of 150 per cent over the base in the nine weeks since it started, says Yashroi. While the first draw drew three million responses, the latest one on 23 May drew 7.5 million responses.
The latest winner of the jackpot of Rs 86.1 million announced yesterday, remains a mystery though. Yashroi claims that the winner is either still unaware of the results or is too overawed to react to the news and hence has not come forward to claim the booty. The online system enables the company to track the winning ticket to the city in which it was sold instantly, but Playwin is not divulging the details till the winner volunteers to collect his prize, Yashroi said.
News Broadcasting
CNN-News18 to air live counting day coverage for five state election results on May 4
The channel is rolling out its biggest election coverage machinery yet for results day on 4th May
NOIDA: The votes have been cast. Now comes the reckoning. CNN-News18 is pulling out all the stops for results day on 4th May, when counting begins across five battleground states — West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Union Territory of Puducherry — in what promises to be one of the most closely watched electoral verdicts in recent memory.
The channel’s coverage, titled Battle for the States: The Verdict, kicks off at 7am and runs through the day across linear TV, connected television and YouTube. It is the culmination of CNN-News18’s multi-format editorial initiative, Battle for the States, which has tracked the polls from the beginning under the theme Road to Power.
At the operational heart of the coverage will be the Live Results Hub, the channel’s central command centre built to collate, verify and process real-time data flowing in from reporters stationed at counting centres across constituencies. The hub combines newsroom intelligence, analytics and on-the-ground reporting to deliver what the channel promises will be the fastest and most accurate results coverage in English news.
Leading the on-air charge will be primetime anchors Rahul Shivshankar, Anand Narasimhan, Aman Sharma, Nabila Jamal and Shivani Gupta. They will be joined by a wide panel of commentators including author Chetan Bhagat; GVL Narasimha Rao, senior leader of the BJP; Smita Prakash, editor of ANI; activist Saira Shah Halim; political analyst Sumanth C Raman; Abhijit Iyer Mitra, senior fellow at IPCS; Amitabh Tiwari, founder of VoteVibe; columnist Abhijit Majumdar; Nalin Mehta, managing editor of MoneyControl; political analyst Tehseen Poonawalla; senior journalist Subir Bhaumik; and political analyst Manojit Mandal.
Shivshankar, who serves as editorial affairs director at CNN-News18, set out the stakes plainly. “Counting day is one of the most watched events in the electoral cycle, where speed and credibility are tested in real time,” he said. “Battle for the States: The Verdict is built on that promise, combining ground reporting, sharp analysis and cutting-edge election technology to give viewers the clearest and fastest route to the verdict. On May 4, CNN-News18 will once again be the nation’s most trusted channel to witness democracy in action.”
Smriti Mehra, chief executive of English and Business News at Network18, framed the coverage in broader terms. “Elections are defining national events, and audiences turn to brands they trust in moments that matter,” she said. “CNN-News18 has consistently led from the front in every election coverage, and this special programming reflects the scale of our ambition and editorial strength.”
The channel has form here. It claims to have been India’s most preferred English news destination for election results for the past 20 years, covering everything from the 2024 general elections to the Delhi, Maharashtra, Bihar and BMC polls on the back of what it calls an “Always First, Always Right” record. Five states, one day, and a nation waiting for answers. The clock starts at 7am on 4th May.
