New Delhi: With News Broadcasters body NBA and NBF warring each other towards for and against release of TRP ratings of News Genre, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has now asked the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to maintain “status quo” on the same until the ministry concludes examination of the report on the matter submitted by a committee.
The MIB has written a letter to BARC,
In the letter, MIB Under-secretary P Nagarajan says, “As you are aware that a committee was constituted by this ministry, dated 04.11.2020, under the chairmanship of Shashi Shekhar Vempati, CEO, Prasar Bharati, to study and examine the deficiencies in the existing TRP system and propose technological advancements/interventions for further strengthening of the procedures for a robust, credible and transparent rating system. The committee has since submitted its report which is under examination. In view of the above, BARC is directed to maintain status quo as at present.”
On 13th February, 51 news channels along with TV9 network wrote a letter to MIB seeking resumption of news channel rating, in the letter addressing to the Information and Broadcasting Minister, Barun Das, the Group CEO of TV9 Network stated “I write to you the reiterate the concerns of hundreds of news channels over the unilateral decision of the BARC to suspend rating for an in-determination period. Initially, we suffered the sudden suspension of rating as we were led to believe that it would be only for a period of 2-3 months which in itself was an irrational decision as I have explained below. That declared duration of suspension is long gone but there is no sign or sight of returning to BARC rating for news genre putting the very survival of news channels in jeopardy.”
NBF and a consortium of 51 News Channels also had written to MIB appealing for its intervention and immediate release of News genre ratings.
In a letter sent to BARC, among other things, NBA demanded an explanation of the concrete steps that have been taken by it in the last three months to secure the ratings.
According to the NBA board, the corrupt data released month after month has not only led to reputation loss but has also caused huge financial losses to news broadcasters.
