Ahead of polls, iTV Network launches 'India News Gujarat'

With election fervour in Gujarat, iTV Network has grabbed the opportunity to launch its new regional channel, India News Gujarat. Aiming at providing curated news content for the Gujarati viewers, the channel enters an already crowded Gujarat news market that has existing players such as ABP Asmita, VTV Gujarat and TV9 Gujarat.

The Gujarat market has a lot of overlap with Hindi, across all genres, including Hindi GECs and movies. For this reason, almost all the national Hindi news players are quite strong in the Gujarat market. As for the Gujarati channels, except for the top spot, which is held by Colors Gujarati, a GEC, the other four out of the top five players are all news channels. At No. 2, ABP Asmita with 15.580 million Impressions in Week 47 is quite close to the No. 1 channel, followed by TV9 Gujarati (13.604 million Impressions), Sandesh News (13.550 million Impressions) and VTV Gujarati (10.826 million Impressions).

Indian News Gujarat will add to iTV Network’s existing regional channel offering that includes India News Haryana, India News Uttar Pradesh-Uttarakhand, India News Rajasthan, India News Madhya Pradesh-Chhattisgarh and India News Punjab.

With this, iTV Network is looking at diving into the Rs 50-60 crore ad market of Gujarati language television. Gujarat contributes about eight per cent to the total Hindi language viewership, while Gujarati channels amount to close to one per cent of the regional television space. The total size of advertising in Gujarat across platforms will be in the range of Rs 1000-1200 crore, of which print gathers about Rs 500-550 crore.

The new channel will focus on well-researched, high-impact content aimed at striking a true chord that captures the imagination of Gujaratis across the globe. The channel will maintain brand India News’ emphasis on current subjects, concerns and trends with entertainment elements thrown in – an infotainment platter aimed at accentuating the uniqueness of Gujarat and Gujaratis. Being launched ahead of the highly-anticipated Gujarat elections 2017, the Gujarat Debate will be a programme to watch out for.

Kartikeya Sharma

Kartikeya Sharma, Founder and Promoter, iTV Network, said, “Regional and local concerns often get subsumed in national broadcasting formats. We strongly believe regional programming must be given the due space and promotion it deserves. The launch of India News Gujarat is our response to the need for credible providers of regional news services in the state. Gujarat is a vibrant, development-oriented state and our new channel seeks to capture its diversity and plurality in the inimitable India News format, characterised by crisp reportage and engaging presentation.”

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