Ever since journalist Arnab Goswami launched his own TV News channel Republic TV, he has maintained top position in the genre. After remaining in top position in the English News sector since its inception, the network’s Hindi channel Republic Bharat has also occupied the top position in viewership data as per BARC (Broadcast Audience Research Council of India), leaving behind established players in the sector like Aaj Tak, India TV, NDTV India etc.
While both the news channels of the Republic network are way ahead of the competition, the difference between Arnab Goswami and the other top anchor seems to be even wider. According to the latest BARC data for the 9 PM slot, which is the prime time for News Channels with shows hosted by their topmost anchors, Republic TV’s viewership is much more than the other English News channels.
Arnab Goswami hosts the show “The Debate With Arnab Goswami At 9” on Republic TV. During the same time slot, journalist Rajdeep Sardesai hosts News Today on India Today, and Navika Kumar hosts the Newshour on Times Now, which was previously hosted by Arnab Goswami when he was at the channel.
The Republic TV market share for the 9 pm slot is whopping 77.18%, which means almost four-fifth of the English News viewers watched the Arnab Goswami’s famous panel discussion program at 9 pm. The next was CNN News18 with 7.56%, and after that at third spot was India TV with 7.02%. The CNN News18 show is Brass Tacks with Zakka Jacob, while on India Today it is the Rajdeep Sardesai hosted program.
The BARC viewership data for the 9 PM for the week 19th September to 25th September show that viewership of Arnab Goswami’s program was more than tens times the viewership of the next programs in the list by Zakka Jacob and Rajdeep Sardesai.
For NDTV, the channel that pioneered the English News sector in India and is also pioneer of the 9PM debate show, the data is even shockingly low, with just 1.30% share in viewership. The 9 PM show for NDTV is hosted by Vishnu Som.
Republic Bharat is also in the top position for the 9 pm slot, although the difference with the competition narrow, unlike the English channels. The channel has 15.8% share for 9 pm, marginally ahead of 14.28% of Zee News, Aaj Tak’s 14.06%, News18 India’s 12.22% and India TV’s 11.58%.
Arnab Goswami has come under attack from other channels like India Today and NDTV for his position on several issues, and relentless coverage of incidents like the Sushant Singh Rajput death case. But time and again the viewership data shows that his programs are liked by the audience, with more than 75% audience watching his show. On the other hand, the channels that keep lecturing him have market share in single digits for the 9pm slot.
