BENGALURU: In a dingdong contest of sorts, pubcaster Doordarshan Network’s English news channel DD India and ARG Outlier Asianet News Network’s Arnab Goswami-led Republic TV have been swapping the first two ranks in Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) weekly lists of top 5 English news channels over the past few weeks.
BARC restarted publishing viewership data in week 13 of 2019 after the implementation of the new tariff order. In weeks 13 and 14 of 2019, DD India was ranked first, while Republic TV was ranked second. In week 15, it was Republic TV that was ranked first and DD India that was ranked second in BARC’s weekly list. The channels interchanged ranks in week 16 of 2019 with DD India in the lead and then once again swapped ranks in week 17 of 2019 with Republic TV at the pole position followed by DD India at second place in BARC’s weekly lists of top 5 English news channels.
In week 17 of 2019 (Saturday, 20 April 2019 to Friday, 26 April 2019, week or period under review), the top 3 channels lost some ratings, the last two has a slight gain in ratings. As mentioned above, in week 17 of 2019, Republic TV was ranked first with 0.574 million weekly impressions as compared to second rank and 0.597 million weekly impressions in week 16.
At second rank was DD India with 0.511 million weekly impressions in week 17 of 2019 as compared to first rank and 0.607 million weekly impressions in the previous week. Times Now has been retaining rank 3 since DD India entered BARC’s weekly lists of top 5 English news channels a few weeks ago. In week 17 of 2019, Times Now, at third rank, garnered 0.428 million weekly impressions as compared to 0.444 million weekly impressions.
India Today TV also retained its previous week's fourth rank in week 17 of 2019 with 0.299 million weekly impressions as compared to 0.268 million weekly impressions in week 16. CNN News18 completed the top 5 channels quintet for the week under review at its previous week’s rank five with 0.289 million weekly impressions as compared to 0.264 million weekly impressions in the previous week.
