News Broadcasting
Govt. has garnered Rs 80 million from FM licencing
NEW DELHI: Till date Rs 79.77 million has accrued to the government as licence fee from FM radio broadcasters.
Bank guarantees of Rs 19 million in respect of three non-metro stations of Bhopal, Indore and Vishakapatnam of Vertex Broadcasting Company Ltd had been encashed, according to government data. Though Vertex had filed a writ petition against it in the New Delhi High Court, it was dismissed.
The bank guarantees were encashed as Vertex, along with Entertainment Network India Ltd for Hyderabad and Lucknow and Music Broadcast Pvt Ltd (to which Star supplies content) for Nagpur and Patna had not deposited the balance of the first year’s licence fee within the due date.
While Vertex’s case was dismissed, Entertainment Network and Music Broadcast’s got a stay against encashment of bank guarantees in respect of Hyderabad, Lucknow and Nagpur and Patna, respectively. The reprieve had come from the Mumbai high court, the government data has pointed out.
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.
