TRPs shoot up as DD airs latest Bollywood hits
The national broadcaster used to earn a revenue of almost Rs 100 crore each year through airing these movies.
New Delhi: India’s state broadcaster Doordarshan is seeing a turnaround in fortunes as telecasting of blockbuster Bollywood movies has more than doubled its TRPs. Within six months of changing its policy by telecasting hit new Hindi films like Dirty Picture, Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Gangs of Wasseypur, Neerja, Dum Laga ke Haisha, Kill Dil and Krish 3, the fortunes of the channel are on the upswing.
Official statistics available with this newspaper revealed that over the three months, the figure for the Sunday film slot has shown the biggest jump of more than 187 per cent in viewership over the corresponding period of three months when these films were not telecast.
Similarly, the Friday film slot has seen a jump of 93 per cent in viewership and the Saturday time slot shows an increase of over 47 per cent in viewership.
With increased TRPs, the Doordarshan top brass is also upbeat, Doordarshan DG Supriya Sahu said, “These figures clearly indicate that we can and are reclaiming lost ground. By airing good cinema, we are giving a tough time to our competitors and gaining viewers.”
This newspaper had on October 11, 2016, reported that in an effort to garner more eyeballs, Doordarshan was planning to completely revamp its film telecast policy and began telecasting latest, blockbuster Hindi movies every weekend.
Sources said that till 2011-12, the national broadcaster used to earn a revenue of almost Rs 100 crore each year through airing these movies. However, the annual revenue from movies has now fallen to approximately Rs 65 crore each year. With the viewership returning to the channel in a big way, the Doordarshan is also expecting to make a windfall in revenue generation this fiscal, sources said.
Another reason for this phenomenal growth in TRPs is that these movies are telecast on Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the 9 p.m. prime time slot from the earlier scheduling of 10 p.m after research found that 9 p.m. was the best to secure higher viewership, sources stated.
With Doordarshan claiming to have a reach of more than 90 percent of the Indian population through a network of more than 1416 terrestrial transmitters the attempt is expected to set it again towards the path of increasing TRPs and revenues, sources stated.