News Broadcasting
Prasar Bharati warns news channels over unauthorised use of Olympic footage
NEW DELHI: In a latest development, it is being learnt that Prasar Bharati which comprises Doordarshan and All India Radio, as the official broadcaster of the Beijing Olympics in India, has issued a letter to news channels for unauthorised use on Olympic footage from Doordarshan.
According to the footage sharing law, any channel is free to air 20 seconds of footage of any event borrowed from any other broadcaster.
The news comes in after Doordarshan made a clear announcement that it would not share the feed for Olympics with any other private broadcaster or news channel.
Says DD coordinator marketing and sport Sukhjinder Kaur, “We had decided earlier that we will not share the feed for Beijing Olympics this year with any other private broadcaster. We had got several enquires related to sharing of feed but we had made clear before the event had started.”
At the moment, DD has just issued a letter to all those news channels who have been found guilty of using the footage of Olympics and feels if the situation persist further action will be taken against the news channels.
Doordarshan deputy director general – sports Ashok Jailkhani adds, “At the moment we have just issued a polite letter to news channels asking them to stop the unauthorised use of Olympic footage as Doordarshan is the official broadcaster of the event. If this practice continues then we will not hesitate to take legal action against those news channels that will be found guilty.”
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: 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.
