Mumbai : Communications and Information & Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad during his inaugural speech yesterday at the FICCI Frames 2016 expressed his reservations over the accuracy of TV Audience Measurement by comparing the no of samples Vs actual TV viewing population.
Raising government’s concern over the issue he said, “TV rating must become more reasonable and fair. I don’t know what has happened now. I have publicly disapproved of TAM Media Research even when I was I&B minister and whatever alternative has come, I am not impressed by that,”
“India is a huge country. How can a few hundred boxes determine which programmes are better and which are not? The government doesn’t want to impose anything, but I am flagging our concern to you. Please come out with a reasonable and fair mechanism to determine the ratings of programmes so that real content can drive the quality of programme,” he added.
Responding positively to the Minister’s comments Partho Dasgupta, CEO of BARC India said “We believe the honble minister expressed a view on improvements and changes in TV audience measurement in india with the launch of BARC India’s services”.
“BARC India strictly follows Govt guidelines on the matter. We have expanded the coverage – with a doubling of sample homes to 20000 within the first year of launch, and inclusion of rural india for the first time ever. We have plans for expanding the panel as per Government guidelines too” he said.
“We are a Joint Industry Body and the number of meters are guided by Industry’s affordability and statistical needs. The number is as agreed by all stakeholders of the industry. Industry has welcomed and accepted BARC india data’s robustness and fidelity” he added.
The minister’s statement was in-fact a shocker for many heads from various Broadcasting networks as BARC India is trying its best to deliver a credible audience ratings data by doubling the sample meter size to 20,000 and further increasing it to 34,000 by merging 12,000 meter owned by TAM and introduced the Rural data for the first time with in the first year of its operations.
