News Broadcasting
Sahara Pariwar pays tribute to Nafisa
MUMBAI: Sahara India Pariwar paid tribute to former Miss India and TV personality Nafisa Joseph on 5 September. Her family (father and sister), her closest friends and also people from the film and fashion fraternity were present to pay their last respects at the ITC Grand Maratha.
The service began with a short film on Nafisa’s life with ex Miss World and one of Nafisa’s closest friends, Diana Hayden, recounting fond memories. Sameer Malhotra read a short poem, Sameer Soni, Cyrus Broacha, Pradeep Guha and photographer Vikram Bawa also shared their memories while MTV VJs Ramona and Sophia sang in Nafisa’s memory.
Among others who came to pay tribute were Kim Sharma, Preeti Jhangiani, Nethra Raghuraman, Suchitra Pillai and Tapur. Nafisa Joseph who passed away on 29 July had apparently committed suicide over personal problems.
Sahara India Pariwar and Nafisa had jointly worked on several of their events over the years. The most recent one being where Nafisa hosted the Laureus World Sports Academy Gala night in Amby Valley, as stated in an official release.
Percept D’Mark (PDM) had previously done many shows with Nafisa and were actually planning on having her host the recent Anti Piracy Show. They, therefore, thought that a tribute celebrating the life of late Nafisa would be befitting.
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.
