News Broadcasting
Star introduces Junior KBC and a winning couple
The Star India team, along with Kaun Banega Crorepati anchor Amitabh Bachchan and producer Siddharth Basu, yesterday presented to the media Vijay Raul and wife Arundhati, the first Crorepatipatni winners of the jackpot prize Rs 10 million. Star broke the news while providing details of KBC Junior, which premiers on Sunday, 6 May at 10 am.
Coincidentally or otherwise, the episode featuring the two winners will be telecast the very next day, 7 May at 9 PM on Star Plus.
The first winners of the ‘Crorepatipatni’ format of KBC where husband and wife contest as partners on the gameshow hail from Rourkela in the eastern state of Orissa. While Raul is a chief assistant engineer at GAIL in Rourkela, Arundhati is a homemaker.
“They were a most unassuming couple, and I least expected them to win,” Bachchan said. “In fact I was under the impression that they probably wouldn’t get past Rs 10,000. But they certainly took me by surprise once they were on the hotseat,” he said.
KBC Junior is organised around young participants between the ages of 10 to 18. “My heart was palpitating, I am still weak-kneed after having shot two episodes continuously,” said Bachchan in a light vein while expressing how he felt hours after the shoot of two episodes with a bunch of enthusiastic and precocious children.
To arrest the fall in KBC‘s popularity, Star, as part of a strategic move, shifted the Thursday show of KBC to Sunday placing it at an apt spot when other competing channels air mythological programmes. The programme has received a good response from the advertisers, said Sameer Nair, executive vice president programming Star Plus. While Compaq is giving away a personal computer to any child who makes it to the hotseat, irrespective of whether he is a winner or not, the channel has promised gifts to the 10 final participants. The channel is optimistic about getting a positive response for the programmes and are expecting a two digit TRP rating for the show, said Nair.
According to Basu KBC Junior has received an overwhelming response, with over 600,000 phone calls in the three days lines were open.
News Broadcasting
Network18 Q4 revenue grows 9.7 per cent, EBITDA at Rs 30 crore
PAT improves to Rs 306.6 crore, margins steady amid cost pressures.
MUMBAI: Not all news is breaking, some of it is quietly improving. Network18 Media & Investments Limited appears to be doing just that, tightening losses and stabilising margins even as costs continue to weigh on the business. For FY26, the company reported revenue from operations of Rs 1,955.1 crore, up from Rs 1,896.2 crore in FY25, signalling modest top-line growth in a challenging media environment. Total income stood at Rs 1,978.2 crore, compared to Rs 1,913 crore a year earlier.
Profit after tax came in at Rs 306.6 crore for the year, a sharp turnaround from Rs 3,225.4 crore in FY25, largely reflecting the absence of large exceptional items that had inflated the previous year’s numbers. On a more comparable basis, the company’s operating performance showed signs of gradual stabilisation.
However, the quarterly picture remained under pressure. For the March quarter, Network18 reported a loss of Rs 53.1 crore, narrower than the Rs 98.1 crore loss in the same period last year, but still indicative of ongoing cost challenges.
Expenses continued to track high. Total expenses for FY26 stood at Rs 2,235.7 crore, up from Rs 2,197.8 crore in FY25. Key cost heads included operational expenses of Rs 765.9 crore, employee benefits of Rs 475.9 crore, and marketing, distribution and promotional spends of Rs 427.1 crore, underlining the continued investment required to sustain reach and engagement.
At an operating level, margins remained under strain. Operating margin stood at 2.33 per cent for FY26, marginally higher than 1.77 per cent in FY25, while net profit margin remained negative at -13.02 per cent, though improved from -14.89 per cent.
On the balance sheet, total assets rose to Rs 8,957.6 crore as of 31 March 2026, from Rs 8,317.5 crore a year earlier. Equity strengthened to Rs 4,958.7 crore, while borrowings increased to Rs 3,112.8 crore, reflecting a higher reliance on debt to support operations.
Cash flows told a mixed story. While financing activities generated Rs 83.9 crore, operating cash flow remained negative at Rs -24 crore, highlighting ongoing pressure on core cash generation. Cash and cash equivalents, however, improved to Rs 33.9 crore from Rs 1.8 crore.
The numbers point to a company in transition growing revenues, trimming losses, but still grappling with structural cost pressures. In a sector where scale often comes at a price, Network18 seems to be inching towards balance, one quarter at a time.
