iWorld
Prime Video launches HITS
Mumbai- Prime Video, India’s most loved entertainment destination, today launched HITS, Rewind Networks’ popular linear television channel and the home to some of the most iconic TV shows, as an add-on subscription, increasing access to English-language series that continue to dominate pop-culture year after year. HITS offers an unparalleled line-up of evergreen blockbuster and fan-favourite shows from Frasier, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Agatha Christie’s Poirot, Agatha Christie’s Marple, Gilligan’s Island, Mission: Impossible, Baywatch and I Dream of Jeannie, to Stephen King’s IT, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Cheers, Bewitched, The Incredible Hulk, North and South, V: The Original Series, The Six Million Dollar Man, Quantum Leap, Hawaii Five-O, The Jeffersons and many more.
With HITS, customers can watch their favourite TV shows according to a fixed linear broadcast schedule, while also getting the option to catch-up on content, post linear airing, as per their convenience. Prime members can purchase an add-on subscription to HITS at an annual price of Rs 299.
“We’re thrilled to launch HITS as an add-on subscription for our customers in India, offering a curated line-up of iconic and much-loved TV shows for scheduled linear viewing, as well as catch-up,” said Prime Video, India head of marketplace (add-on subscriptions and movie rentals) Gaurav Bhasin said, “Our aim with add-on subscriptions has been to provide Prime members with increased choice, improved accessibility and greater convenience of watching their favourite content all within a single app, and within a short span of time, we’ve built a robust library of additional programming through our partners. At the same time, add-on subscriptions have also offered increased reach to both local and global streamers helping them connect with our vast and diverse audience across the country. We are certain that the incredible line-up of TV shows offered by HITS will delight and entertain customers, taking them on a nostalgic trip when enjoying some of the world’s most popular and timeless series.”
“We are delighted to partner with Prime Video to give viewers across India an opportunity to experience HITS,” said Rewind Networks EVP Sandie Lee. “HITS has always been about celebrating the vast television history, and with this collaboration, we are excited to offer customers the opportunity to rediscover these iconic shows conveniently.”
Gaming
India’s broadcasters say no to Fifa World Cup 2026
Fifa has slashed its asking price by 65 per cent but India’s broadcasters are still not buying
MUMBAI: The world’s biggest sporting event cannot find a single taker in the world’s most sports-mad nation. Fifa’s television rights for the 2026 World Cup remain unsold in India, and the clock is ticking loudly.
To shift the property, world football’s governing body has already swallowed hard and cut its asking price from $100m to $35m, bundling in the 2030 edition as a sweetener. It has not worked. Indian broadcasters have looked at the offer, done the sums and quietly walked away.
The reasons are brutally simple. The 2026 tournament, co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico, kicks off in a time zone that turns India’s primetime into a graveyard shift. Most matches will air between midnight and 7am IST, a scheduling catastrophe for advertisers chasing mass reach. The 2022 Qatar edition was a gift by comparison, with matches dropping neatly into Indian evenings. North America offers no such luxury.
The market itself has also changed beyond recognition. The merger of Star India and Viacom18 into JioStar has gutted the competitive tension that once sent sports rights prices soaring. Where rival bidders once slugged it out, there is now a single dominant buyer, and it is in no hurry. JioStar has valued the rights at roughly $25m, a full $10m below Fifa’s already-discounted floor price. That gap has so far proved unbridgeable.
Broadcasters are also nursing a ferocious cricket hangover. Between 2022 and 2023, Indian media houses committed well over $10bn to cricket rights alone, covering IPL, ICC events and BCCI domestic fixtures combined. After a binge of that scale, appetite for a football package that delivers a fraction of the ratings, in the dead of night, is close to zero.
The economics of football broadcasting make the maths even harder. Cricket, with its natural breaks every few overs, is an advertiser’s paradise. Football offers a 15-minute halftime and precious little else. Recovering a nine-figure rights fee from a single half-hour ad window is a stretch at the best of times. These are not the best of times: the Indian government’s tightening grip on real-money gaming and gambling advertising has vaporised a category that once underwrote the economics of big sporting events.
Nor is the World Cup an anomaly. Indian Super League valuations have cratered. English Premier League rights have softened across successive cycles. The cooling of football as a broadcast commodity in India is structural, not cyclical.
With the tournament opening on 11th June, Fifa is running out of road. It may yet blink and meet JioStar at $25m. Or it may go direct, streaming the entire tournament on its own platform, Fifa+, or cutting a digital deal with YouTube, and hoping that a generation of Indian football fans finds its way there without a broadcaster to guide them.
Either way, the beautiful game’s Indian chapter is looking decidedly ugly.
