News Broadcasting
UP govt, blames media for increase in violence against women
NEW DELHI: The Uttar Pradesh government has blamed the vulgarity and violence shown on television for the increase in cases of rape and violence against women.
After Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav’s statement, the party’s national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav who is cousin of Mulayam Singh Yadav and uncle to Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, blamed increase in crime against women to “vulgarity, obscenity and violence shown on the television channels.” He added: “Young boys also have easy access to magazines with pornographic material and pictures,” he said.
When Mulayam Singh Yadav was asked about increase in violence against women he said, “You do your work and let us do our work.”
Earlier, even Akhilesh Singh Yadav had blamed the media. Both Mulayam Singh and Ram Gopal followed suit asking why the media was only highlighting criminal incidents of Uttar Pradesh but is ignoring other states. “But the media does not report that,” he said, adding that “if you search on Google, you will find many rape incidents in other states, too.”
The SP leadership had earlier blamed media for Muzaffarnagar riots.
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.
