News Broadcasting
ABP News celebrates Women’s Day with ‘Shakti Samman’
MUMBAI: Initiating a conversation on gender stereotypes, ABP News Network’s Hindi news channel ABP News held an event, ‘Shakti Samman’ in the light of International Women’s Day.
The event was graced by union cabinet minister Smriti Irani, who threw light on the theme of gender stereotypes. She said, “Men are not the problem, the mindsets are.”
She also felicitated mindset challengers like Deepa Malik (Chairman – Paralympic Committee of India), Dr Seema Rao (India's first woman commando trainer, having trained Special Forces of India), Aarohi Pandit (First woman in the world to fly solo across the Atlantic in an LSA), Chitra Rajagopal (Distinguished Scientist & Director General (RM & Impl.), DRDO, Ministry of Defence), Sunchika Pandey (The woman behind Mumbai Police's Twitter handle), Anuradha Prabhudesai (Founder, Lakshaya Foundation), Rajkumari Devi (Also known as ‘Kisan Chachi’ – She empowered over 300 rural women to take up farming, and lead an independent life), and Asha Devi (Nirbhaya’s mother).
Through this initiative, ABP aims to reflect on the experiences of these powerful women, work towards eliminating stereotypes and provide a platform to empowered women — to empower women.
Shakti Samman is an initiative to inspire society to look at women for who they are and not how they look. With the idea of ‘Mindset Challengers’, ABP News has taken up a challenge to break the regressive mind-set about women in our society and shed light on the lives of strong personalities who are making strides for gender equality in their respective industries.
The event witnessed young men and women taking an oath to challenge mindsets and help grow the nation by eliminating biases around women, recognising them for their work & skills and not for their appearances.
ABP News Network chief executive officer Avinash Pandey, says, “Women’s Day is not only a tremendous opportunity to celebrate strong females but also a call to action for everyone to continue to push for complete gender equality."
He adds, “This year we have initiated an eminent theme to challenge the retrogressive mindsets in the society, by sharing the stories of many inspiring women who have made significant strides in different fields and were an active contributor in ensuring equitable norms for women all across the country.”
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.
