News Broadcasting
Governmenent of India joins hands with NDTV Ethnic Retail
MUMBAI: The Development Commissioner (Handlooms), Ministry of Textiles, Government of India and NDTV Ethnic Retail Ltd. has signed a memorandum of understanding for popularizing India Handloom textiles as a fashionable product for youth. The three-year long agreement has been signed on 10 May at Udyog Bhawan.
With this joint endeavour, they will endorse and launch a project by NDTV. Titled as Indianroots Fashion Accelerator (IFA) the project will support fresh talent and to support new and innovative ventures in fashion industry. The government will support the project with incubation and production support.
The brand will also provide an interface for fashion professionals will be able to accesses facilities such as weavers service centres and handloom clusters. The initiative will connect fashion designers with handloom sector in an organized manner.
“We see this partnership as a welcome move, it will collaboratively take forward the vision of India Handloom and the “Make In India” vision of Honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. The initiative would help us in our objective of promoting traditional handwoven products of India. Our vision is to touch every Indian with the cultural legacy of India. This will also help us engage with youngsters and designers who will take our handloom legacy forward”, said Handlooms development commissioner Alok Kumar NDTV Ethnic Retail Limited chief innovation officer Aneesh Nair was also present on the occasion.
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.
