News Broadcasting
CNBC TV18 to launch talk show with Vir Sanghvi
MUMBAI: English business news channel CNBC TV18 is launching a new weekend talk show with Vir Sanghvi on 6 February.
The show, Off the Record, will air every Saturday at 8 pm and have a repeat telecast at 9 pm on Sundays. It will focus on some of the biggest names in politics and policymaking, depicting their professional journey and their insights on the biggest issues of the day.
The first show will see Vir Sanghvi meeting Home Minister P Chidambaram. The home minister will speak on 26/11, Indo-Pak relations, the diplomatic efforts in bringing perpetrators to justice and re-invigorating India’s security apparatus.
Says TV18 director Ajay Chacko, “We have relentlessly focused on programming that provides insights into the heart of Indian policy making and politics. Off the Record is a significant addition to that portfolio of content.”
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.
