News Broadcasting
Eternal Dreams to scout for singing talent every year
MUMBAI: Eternal Dreams, a media company promoted by Sapna Chaturvedi, is seeking to honour bards.
And it is doing it in memory of India’s greatest singer ever, the eternal Kishore Kumar. The company, which has been slowly but surely working on turning around the Rathikant Basu promoted Tara Marathi and Bengali, has initiated the Kishore Kumar Award – which will honour two singing talents each year: one for established singers and the other for a new voice who can recreate the magic of the Maestro, Kishore Kumar.
Some permanent members of the jury who will judge the entries include: Amit Kumar, Kishan Kumar of T Series, Ratan Jain of Venus, Kumar S Taurani of Tips, Ekta Kapoor of Balaji Telefilms, Praveen Shah of Time and music directors Dabboo Malik and Himesh Reshammiya. Apart from these, there will be other members who will be decided each year prior to the selections.
Chaturvedi says Eternal Dreams will handle the winners’ careers for six months. “We hope to present the Indian music industry with some exceptional talents in the coming years,”she adds. The award was unveiled by film star Jeetendra at a musical extravaganza based on the songs of Kishoreda last weekend. Among the singers who turned up and crooned at no cost included Kumar Sanu, Vinod Rathod, Babul Supriyo, Shaan and Dabboo Malik. Making his debut on stage was Kishore Kumar’s youngest son Sumeet Kumar, who enthralled the audience with his promising performance.
Balaji Telefilms chairman Jeetendra Kappor (extreme left) and Eternal Dreams MD Sapna Chaturvedi (extreme right) at the musical extravaganza last weekend
The surprise discovery of the evening, however, was Pankaj Chaturvedi, a singer who wears two hats with the ease of a magician. Pankaj who evoked nostalgic memories of Kishoreda with the best of his memorable numbers is also the CEO of Baskin Robbins (South Asia), the largest international ice cream chain in India.
The show, a tribute to Kishore Kumar, is to be aired on DD Metro and has the backing of Tide detergent, Dabur and Win 94.6 with Regent Hotels being the hospitality partner.
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.
