News Broadcasting
Big Cabinet Reshuffle: Prakash Javadekar steps down as I&B minister
New Delhi: Prakash Javadekar has stepped down as the union minister of information and broadcasting, here on Wednesday. The decision is part of one of the biggest cabinet reshuffles during the second term of PM Narendra Modi-led government.
Apart from Javadekar, Ravi Shankar Prasad who held the portfolio of the ministry of electronics and information technology (meity) also submitted his resignation along with ten other ministers. The list also included the union minister of health and family welfare Harsh Vardhan. Javadekar also held charge for the ministry of environment, forest, and climate change.
Later in the evening, as many as 43 new ministers took oath at Rashtrapati Bhawan, however, the new portfolios are yet to be announced. A total of 15 individuals were sworn in as ministers in the Union Cabinet and another 28 as ministers of state (MoS). The cabinet has now grown in strength from 54 to 78 ministers which include several new names, and representation from states like Karnataka, Rajasthan, and north-eastern states.
There are 11 women in the new cabinet. Nisith Pramanik (35), the Lok Sabha MP from West Bengal’s Cooch Behar, is the youngest minister to be sworn in, while the oldest member in the council of ministers is 72-year-old Som Parkash. There are 78 members in the council of ministers now.
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.
