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The Business of News
All of us in the business will agree that 2009 was not the best of years. But the good thing about it was that the world of business learnt the hard way that business is not just about excel sheets and that the valuation on those excel sheets does not attract attention in a hurry.
Media was possibly one of the worst hit sectors across the world. Quite logically so; one of the first cost cutting steps, if not the first, is usually, if not always, slashing of advertising expenses. More often than not, in recessionary circumstances, advertising is no more considered as an essential investment.
News industry in India, however, was not that badly hit as the country went through a General Election. But there’s much more in the news on TV News industry! Read on…
News television is supposed to have two distinct identities. As the fourth estate, it is supposed to inform and empower the viewers, work as a watch dog to the policy makers and implementers. It is supposed to perform the role of a facilitator for our citizens, many of whom are disadvantaged and aggrieved, or for those groups which believe they have a legitimate and justifiable grievance against the powers that be. All this requires us to act as custodians of public interest. The other identity is as private sector organisations we are bound by the rules of the big bad market of balance sheets and ROI.
Most people seem to think that these two distinct identities are at conflict, but I‘m willing to take a bet that they are not. But we sure have a lot to worry about – both our public and private interests.
First about our reducing role in the public interest space. The viewership (GRP) figures of news television in India paint a disquieting picture. The GRPs slipped from 236 in 2007 to 221 in 2008 and to 166 last year, a 30 per cent shrink in just two years. I am at a loss to pinpoint a particular reason for the slide. However, regional channels are robustly augmenting. As a thumb rule, a regional news channel should have 70 to 80 per cent local news. Are audiences then more interested in closer home realities than the larger canvass?
Are viewers deserting news channels? Is there a significant change in rating base which has caused this decline? Does our gut-feel endorse these slipping numbers?
Let me cite a small anecdote. Once when former US president Lyndon B Johnson was asked his views about the media, he had quipped: “If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac River, the headline that afternoon would read: “The President Can‘t Swim.”
He may have said this decades ago but it captures to a great extent how Indian media too can influence or draw interferences from a simple and straightforward piece of news. In the spider-web of competition, the truth sometimes gets strangled. But is that all? I wish, it was.
Like for instance, what would you call “Breaking News” in today’s context? Before that, how would you define “News” ? In my own understanding, reporting of any incidence that is “topical” and “relevant” is news. Tabloid journalism possibly compromises with the relevance factor, but still remains topical. And thus “breaking news” would be an initial (ideally first!) reporting of an incident or development which would be relevant for a certain section of audience.
But the Indian news media has redefined “Breaking News”. It could be anything from what the babas and tantriks have to say to what the astrologers’ take on eclipses is, what the cats, dogs, snakes and the likes are engaged with! This unthinking, wavered ways of the news channels has taken the sheen away from the respect we used to command as organisations with social responsibility.
Thankfully, we in our ( Zee News Limited) news channels do not have such wide canvas for “Breaking News” and our editors still stick to the literal translation of the two words under reference. And it was thus with some sense of concern, as also with an equal feeling of social responsibility, that in May 2008 Zee News took a conscious decision to break free from the trend of hype and hoopla. Respecting the intellect of Indian audience, we brought our focus back to facts, analysis, perspective, reportage and the likes. I can say today, with some satisfaction, that we have not wavered from our path since, despite pulls and pressures from the policies of competition. We held steadfast in dishing out for our viewers news that was accurate and relevant, across all bands and in all languages that we deal with. Clearly, our guiding principles worked and we witnessed all-round growth across channels.Let’s now look at the business of news. Did you notice that the sole criterion that a media brand or organisation is evaluated in India is nothing but the TRP numbers? Logically there’s nothing wrong in it as higher TRP would lead to higher advertising. Advertising is still about 80 per cent of the broadcast sector‘s revenues in India and hence that should lead to higher profitability. However, in India, as known to most by now, profitability is not just TRP numbers. Rational cost structure, innovative strategy, network economy of scale etc have significant influence on the way business is done and hence on the bottom-line of any business. Thankfully, the economic recession has brought the attention back to current bottom-line. Valuation is no more the buzzword. Current deliveries are at the core of all decisions with respect to a business outfit. While the marketing and programming departments still get credit for the TRP numbers, the business leaders would have to wake up to serious questions on returns and profitability from those who are funding the businesses. I assure you that the TRP rankings and profitability do not always have a direct corelation. At least in our case the latter far out-performs the former.
Yet, I‘m not without hope. As an eternal optimist, I feel that the future of news TV is far more promising than what seems on the surface. The industry body, the News Broadcasters Association (NBA), has come up with commendable achievements in its effort to self-regulate. It is encouraging for NBA to get significant acknowledgement from the Ministry of Information and broadcasting.
I firmly believe that the most potent regulator has always been the “market”. Here in our case, finally the audience has the last say on what they want from news TV and they would make their verdict loud and clear, eventually. And then digitisation would ease out the distribution bottle neck and the news genre would experience explosive growth. As I have always mentioned, regionalisation of TV would be a primary growth driver.
As I debate the minutiae about dropping viewership trends in my mind, I feel that there is no one distinct phenomenon for the present exodus and it is possible that it just a matter of perspective.
So I leave it to you to mull it over as well.
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.
