News Broadcasting
DD Metro lines up film fare for New Year Eve
MUMBAI: DD Metro will ring in the New Year with style, rather filmi style.
The channel will start New Year celebrations from 5.30 pm on 31 December with blockbuster film Coolie No 1, followed by Pyar To Hona Hi Tha. The highlight of the evening will be the New Year special event Non Stop Music Masti 2002. Eternal Dreams has bagged the exclusive marketing rights for DD Metro’s New Year Bonanza.
DD Metro’s New Years’ special event featuring singers and dance performers like Shweta Menon, Abbey, Sanober Kabir, Vinay Anand, Ishaan of Mohabbatein fame, Somya Rao ofDum fame and Pankajj, will be telecast from 10.30 pm to 1.30 am. Jimmy Moses, Johny Lever’s brother, and Razak Khan will perform their comic acts for the event. The event will mark the first stage appearance of Vivek Oberoi , who will perform the title song of his to be released film Dum .
DD Metro will also air blockbusters like Coolie No-1, Virasat and Shakti , from 5.30 pm to 1.30 pm on the first day of the New Year.
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.
