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Media During Deluge in Chennai
MUMBAI: The historic floods of the Century that ravaged Chennai in December 2015 has a few lessons for the media. It was the absence of national media in the initial stages of the deluge and the criticism thereof that brought to fore the relevance of local FM radio to the rescue of the battered people of the flooded plains. The first casualty in the flooded areas was electricity and the hype TV channels wanted to create reached none of the victims who were in dire straits to contact the volunteers for help. It was Chennai Live FM 104.1 that managed an Operational Command post of sorts, connecting the victims and a number of cell phone armed individual volunteers and NGOs. Other FM channels followed suit. All India Radio’s RJs came handy with total service agenda on all days, that followed heaviest dumping of 1605.2 mm by the rain clouds, which accounted for 130 per cent above the average rainfall of the North East monsoons this season in Chennai alone. The rainfall on 2 December in Chennai alone is more than the annual rainfall of some of the wettest European nations.
The realty greed that respected no water places and flood plains converted most of the storm water courses and marsh lands into posh colonies in the last two decades that turned into watery graves in Chennai this monsoon. People unwittingly removed bamboo bushes and trees along the bunds of ponds and reservoirs that added to the misery of Chennai. The Chemberambakkam lake, the life line of Chennai swelled so perilously forcing release of 34500 cusecs of water or 10 lac litres of water per second through the sluice gates on 2 December, inundating fields, homes, the airport and heavily inhabited areas of Chennai mercilessly that never experienced the fury of floods in the past. The only communication possible was through radio waves when the mobile towers, telephone exchanges and sub stations of electricity got flooded and most of the facilities came under water and crashed. Most of the flooded areas had water reaching the first floor forcing power shut down in the whole city.
The mapping of flood plains and the storm water course in all the inundated areas of Chennai would have taken a few years of survey but the Mother Nature has delineated the same in a matter of few days along with pain and misery to the people of Chennai. Such details documented by radio stations and TV channels would be of great use to the policy makers in the near future.
But resilience of Chennai was on its best when most of the FM stations started receiving calls from the affected people raising SOS messages. The Radio Jockeys continued without respite to broadcast the distress calls reaching the NGOs and individuals ready to help. Some anchors were checking and telling Chennaiites the rainfall details, road conditions, water level, actual need of the victims from torch light, charge packs, food, milk, blankets medical assistance and so on. An IAF helicopter could evacuate a pregnant woman to labour room with active and accurate information from the spot through cell phone to the studio. The contact details from where the help could reach the affected areas was best done by the FM stations of Chennai when hundreds of land phones with government control rooms could not aid rescue when they went dumb due to gushing waters. One thing was very clear, Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Jains… every one joined hands breaking the divisive barriers of religion, language or the region. Foremost in the minds of the rescuers was safety of human beings and rescue operations by teams and individuals with the tinge of heroism. Humanity was reigning supreme.
It was the innovative skills of Radio Jockeys that kept repeating dos and don’ts for the people in the hours of emergency. While the TV channels contributed immensely to show the external world, the gravity of the devastation with a bird’s eye view of affected areas, the Army, Navy and NDRF could do the rescue operations efficiently. The credit for huge resource mobilisation of relief materials and efficient dissemination of information and resultant coordination goes to the electronic media of Chennai especially, the FM Radio.
Chennaiites are proud of their media at its best in the cause of relief and rebuilding.
(The views expressed here are those of the author and Indiantelevision.com need not necessarily subscribe to the same.)
MUMBAI: 2025 will be remembered as the year India’s OTT industry stopped chasing scale for its own sake and began reckoning with how audiences actually consume content. Completion rates fell, patience wore thin and the limits of long-form excess became impossible to ignore. In this guest column, Pratap Jain, founder and CEO of ChanaJor, traces how micro-drama moved from the fringes to the centre of viewing behaviour, why short-form fiction emerged as a retention engine rather than a trend, and how platforms that respected time, habit and emotional payoff were the ones that truly grew up in 2025.
If there is one thing 2025 will be remembered for in the Indian OTT industry, it’s this: the industry finally stopped pretending.
Stopped pretending that bigger automatically meant better.
Stopped pretending that viewers had endless time.
Stopped pretending that scale without retention was success.
What began as a quiet reset in 2023 and a cautious correction in 2024 turned into a very visible shift in 2025. Business models matured. Content strategies tightened. And most importantly, platforms started aligning themselves with how Indians actually watch content, not how the industry wished they would.
At the centre of this shift was micro-drama—not as a trend, but as a behavioural inevitability.
When OTT finally understood the time problem
For years, long episodes were treated as a marker of seriousness. A 45–60 minute runtime was almost a badge of credibility. Shorter formats were pushed to the margins, labelled as “snack content” or “mobile-only.”
That belief quietly collapsed in 2025.
What platform data showed very clearly was not a drop in interest—but a drop in patience. Viewers weren’t rejecting stories. They were rejecting commitment.
Across platforms, the same patterns appeared:
* First-episode drop-offs on long-form shows kept increasing
* Completion rates continued to slide
* Viewers were sampling more titles but finishing fewer
At the same time, shows with episodes in the six to 10 minute range started showing the opposite behaviour: higher completion, higher repeat viewing, and stronger daily habit formation.
Micro-drama didn’t win because it was short. It won because it respected time.
Micro-Drama didn’t arrive loudly. It took over quietly.
There was no single moment when micro-drama “launched” in India. It crept in through dashboards and retention charts.
By mid-2025, it was clear that viewers were happy watching four, five, sometimes six short episodes in one sitting—even when they wouldn’t finish a single long episode. Romance, relationship drama, slice-of-life conflict, and grounded comedy worked especially well.
This wasn’t disposable content. It was compressed storytelling.
In shorter formats, there was no room for indulgence. Every episode had to move the story forward. Weak writing was punished faster. Strong writing was rewarded immediately.
Micro-drama raised the bar instead of lowering it.
Where ChanaJor naturally fit into this shift
ChanaJor didn’t pivot to micro-drama in 2025 because the market demanded it. In many ways, the platform was already built around the same viewing behaviour.
From the beginning, ChanaJor focused on short-to-mid-length fictional stories that felt close to everyday Indian life—hostels, rented flats, office romances, small-town relationships, young people figuring things out. Stories that didn’t need heavy context or cinematic scale to connect.
What worked in ChanaJor’s favour in 2025 was clarity:
* A clearly defined audience
* Tight episode lengths
* Storytelling that prioritised emotion and pace over spectacle
While several platforms rushed to copy global micro-drama formats, ChanaJor stayed rooted in familiar Indian settings and conflicts. That familiarity mattered. Viewers didn’t have to “enter” the world of the show—it already felt like theirs.
Why audiences started responding differently
One of the biggest misconceptions going into 2025 was that audiences wanted shorter content because their attention spans had reduced. That wasn’t entirely true.
What viewers actually wanted was meaningful payoff per minute.
On platforms like ChanaJor, episodes didn’t waste time setting the mood for ten minutes. Conflicts arrived early. Characters were recognisable within moments. Emotional hooks landed fast.
A typical consumption pattern looked like real life:
* One episode during a break
* Two more before sleeping
* A few the next day
This is how viewing habits are built—not through marketing spends, but through comfort and consistency.
Viewers came back not because every show was a blockbuster, but because they knew what kind of experience to expect.
2025 was also the year OTT faced business reality
The other big change in 2025 was on the business side. Subscriber growth slowed. Discounts stopped hiding churn. Customer acquisition costs rose.
Platforms were forced to ask harder questions:
* Are viewers finishing what they start?
* Are they returning without reminders?
* Is this content worth what we’re spending on it?
This is where micro-drama began outperforming expectations. A well-written short series could deliver sustained engagement without massive budgets. It didn’t peak for one weekend and disappear—it stayed alive through repeat viewing.
Platforms like ChanaJor benefited because they weren’t chasing inflated launch numbers. The focus was on consistency and retention, not noise.
Failures Became Visible Faster
2025 also exposed weaknesses brutally.
Several platforms assumed micro-drama was a shortcut—short episodes, quick shoots, instant traction. What they discovered was that bad writing fails faster in short formats than in long ones.
Viewers dropped off within minutes. Episodes were abandoned mid-way. Weak stories had nowhere to hide.
Micro-drama didn’t forgive laziness. It amplified it.
The platforms that survived were the ones that treated short storytelling with the same seriousness as long-form—sometimes more.
OTT Stopped Chasing Prestige and Started Chasing Habit
Perhaps the most important shift in 2025 wasn’t technical or creative—it was psychological.
OTT stopped trying to look like cinema. It stopped chasing validation through scale and awards alone. It began behaving like what it actually is in people’s lives: a daily companion.
Platforms like ChanaJor found their space here because that mindset was already baked in. The goal wasn’t to dominate a weekend launch. It was to quietly become part of someone’s everyday viewing routine.
That shift changed everything—from release strategies to how success was measured.
What 2025 Ultimately Taught the Industry
By the end of the year, three truths were impossible to ignore:
* Time is the most valuable thing a viewer gives you
* Retention matters more than reach
* Format must follow behaviour, not ego
Micro-drama didn’t take over because it was fashionable. It took over because it fit real life.
Looking Ahead
Micro-drama is not replacing long-form storytelling. It is redefining the baseline of engagement.
Longer shows will survive—but only when they earn their length. Short-form fiction will continue to evolve, becoming sharper, more emotionally confident, and better written.
Platforms like ChanaJor have shown that it’s possible to grow without shouting—by understanding the audience, respecting their time, and telling stories that feel real.
2025 wasn’t the year OTT became smaller. It was the year it became smarter.
Note: The views expressed in this article are solely the author’s and do not necessarily reflect our own.
