News Broadcasting
BBC documentary commissioner Nicola Moody calls it a day
MUMBAI: Nicola Moody who is BBC’s commissioner for documentaries and contemporary factual series has called it a day. She has decided not to proceed with an application to take a commissioning editor role in the newly streamlined factual commissioning team.
Moody was instrumental in the revamp of BBC’s car show Top Gear. BBC Television director Jana Bennett said, “I am very sad to lose Nicola as she has been a key member of the senior television team for a number of years, but I do completely understand her desire for a fresh challenge.
“She has brought the kind of broad perspective that comes from her career having spanned in-house production, the independent sector, commissioning and running a channel. The same fantastic diversity she has in experience is mirrored in the award-winning output she has delivered across the BBC’s family of channels – from Great Britons and Restoration to Himalaya with Michael Palin, The Hunt for Britain’s Paedophiles.”
Moody commented, ” I am very proud of the successful range of programmes I’ve brought to all four channels and it was a wonderful experience running BBC Four but I have decided that it is time for a new challenge. I’ve thought long and hard about what I want to do with the next phase of my career and while I will miss everyone enormously, there is a lot going on in the wider industry and I want to be part of it.”
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.
