A recent report reveals the significantly greater airtime dedicated to the BJP as compared to other political parties on India’s major Hindi news channels. The report is based on data collected by BARC.
Kavya Thomas | The New Leam
Recently a report was published in the Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar regarding the airtime provided to various political parties.
The report that was published in the daily was based on data which was collected from Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC).
The report suggests that within a period of one month, while PM Modi was allotted a total of 722 hours, Mr. Amit Shah got nearly a screen time of 123 hours. The report calculated the number of hours television news channels dedicated to various political parties between April 1-28, 2019.
If we compare the time given to political opponents and top leaders like Congress President Rahul Gandhi and general secretary Priyanka Gandhi, they received a screen time of just 335 hours from these channels. BARC data revealed that Congress President Rahul Gandhi got an airtime of 251 hours within the stipulated time.
The data provided by BARC shows that television news channels dedicated about 722 hours of screen time to the BJP and Congress was given a screen time that was much lesser in comparison to that which was allotted to the former.
One of the reasons why most Hindi news channels chose to dedicate longer screen time to the ruling regime may be due to the fact that this apparently boosts their target rating points (TRP).
