News Broadcasting
New Prasar CEO to leverage DD’s reach & bank on creative content, tech & social media
MUMBAI: Doordarshan under the new Prasar Bharati CEO Shashi Shekhar Vempati is expected to scale new heights.
He has some plans up his sleeve. When they are done with restoring the glory of AIR and DD by 2022, other channels would look pale, he told OneIndia.
The DD network continued to have the widest reach across all channels. Vempati believes the reach was their strength and they would have to build on it to make a difference through creative use of content and innovative use of technology.
The CEO plans expand the reach and deepen DD’s engagement in social media — so that it is impactful and effective, as a first priority.
Vempati plans to restore trust in the Prasar Bharati ecosystem across all their stakeholders, especially their external partners and internal.
The CEO finds it unfortunate that several critical issues had not been addressed resulting in a trust deficit and unnecessary litigation. Vempati plans work closely with all of the Prasar stakeholders to restore trust in their operations, policies and transactions.
Nostalgia about DD, the new CEO believes, was the starting point for building “Brand Loyalty.” However, to attract and retain viewers, they had to go far beyond nostalgia. He believes they would have to capture the imagination of India’s youth, engage them with compelling content, and become a significant part of their everyday life.
DD had the responsibility to reflect Indian values, Indian ethos, and the aspirations of a billion plus people. The world deserves to be told the India experience and the India story. The globe, Vempati believes, also needs to hear out to India’s perspective on global events and shifts in geo-politics.
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.
