News Broadcasting
ESS acquires NBA telecast rights till 2006
SINGAPORE: ESPN Star Sports, has announced that it has acquired live cable and satellite broadcast rights to NBA for the next four consecutive seasons, the first of which began last week.
The channels will carry two live games a week during the regular season, the star-studded All-Star Weekend and three live games per week during playoffs. In addition ESPN will carry the entire Western Conference finals of this season as well as the NBA Finals. This agreement covers India, most of Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea. The NBA is also available in China on Star Sports. In the Philippines, there will be two live NBA playoff games each week through the first two rounds of the playoffs.
An official release informs that with more Asians playing basketball in the NBA, specifically Chinese players, NBA action is gaining ground in Asia. With Mainland Chinese players Wang Zhizhi of the LA Clippers, Mengke Bateer of the San Antonio Spurs, and most recently, top draft pick Yao Ming of the Houston Rockets set to make waves in the NBA, the fan base in the region is expected to expand considerably as more and more Asians get into the game.
The NBA Champion Los Angeles Lakers, with superstars Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, will be looking for a fourth consecutive Championship title, while Eastern Conference Champion New Jersey Nets led by Jason Kidd and Chris Webber’s Sacramento Kings will be among a host of teams looking to dethrone them.
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.
