CNBC TV18 and CNBC Awaaz rule budget viewership

As Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presented the Union Budget 2018 on February 1, CNBC TV18 and CNBC Awaaz led the English business news and Hindi business news genres, respectively, according to the viewership data released by BARC India. While the two channels have remained on the top of their respective segments, the Budget telecast boosted their viewership exponentially.

Within the English business news genre, CNBC TV18 led with 1,424 Impressions (’000s) in Week 5 that captured viewership from January 27 to February 2. ET Now, from Times Network, grabbed the second spot with 608 Impressions (’000s), followed by BTVI that garnered 110 Impressions (’000s). The HD variant of CNBC TV18 – CNBC TV18 Prime HD – was at No. 4 with 35 Impressions (’000s). (Source: BARC | TG: Males 22+ AB | Market: All India | Period: Week 05'18).

Looking closely at the Hindi business news segment, CNBC Awaaz was on the top by clocking 3169 Impressions (’000s), while the only other player in the segment, Zee Business, garnered 866 Impressions (’000s).

Avinash Kaul

Speaking on the performance of CNBC-TV18 and CNBC Awaaz, Avinash Kaul, President, Network18, said, “CNBC-TV18 continues to maintain its dominance and reaffirms the fact that the channel is India’s budget headquarters, yet again. CNBC-Awaaz, on the other hand, provides news that matters the most to the masses, in the language of the masses. The figures stand testament to the outstanding performance recorded by both channels of being number one across the general and business news category for both English and Hindi. The news channels stand out for their unmatched reporting quality and standards, compelling content and stellar marketing activities.”

The dominance of business news channels during budget week was evident with the fact that CNBC-TV18 had higher viewership than Republic TV and Times Now combined.

English news genre (NCCS AB, Male 22+, Market: All India) too maintained almost the same rankings in the week when Budget was telecast. Republic TV was on the top of the genre with 757 Impressions (’000s), followed by Times Now that clocked 636 Impressions (’000s). India Today Television from the TV Today Network was ranked third with 243 Impressions (’000s). CNN-News18 from the Network 18 group was at No. 4 with 195 Impressions (’000s). NDTV 24x7 was the fifth most watched English news genre with 180 Impressions (’000s).

Vikas Khanchandani

Commenting on the numbers, Vikas Khanchandani, CEO, Republic TV, said, “Republic TV broke viewership records since its very first day of broadcast and has since gone from strength to strength on the back of exclusive content broken first in the market. The Union Budget 2018 was no exception. With the last Full Budget before National Elections in 2019, this year was crucial in defining the incumbent governments strategy and hence eagerly awaited by the viewers. Our market share displays our clear hold over the English news viewer.”

Aaj Tak was the leader in the Hindi news genre by garnering 124533 Impressions (’000s). Zee News and ABP News bagged the second and third places with 99801 and 91510 Impressions (‘000s), respectively. India TV followed closely behind at fourth with 89370 Impressions (‘000s) while News18 India stood fifth with 84965 Impressions (‘000s).

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