There is an old saying that everything is fair in love and war. But India’s electronic media has also added the term Television Rating Point (TRP) to it. Indian channels have been making their place in the TRP race in the past. After the recent terrorist attacks in Jammu and Kashmir and subsequent airstrikes by India on terrorist bases in Pakistan, the manner in which most of the channels tried to incite war hysteria has become a global rage. But the channel people are neither ready to accept their mistake nor to rectify it. The attitude adopted by the electronic media recently has raised questions about its credibility, the race of TRP
Dozens of new channels are raising their heads every year in India. Barring the top five-six of them, the rest of the channels are out of the race for TRP. But the way the top channels are competing for TRP is very shameful. The actors of the channel are ready to go to any level to get the TRP. Recently, during the Indo-Pak tension, a funny situation appeared on these channels. If they were under their control when the war had started. Some used to come on the screen wearing army dresses and some used to sit in cannon. And that too by creating a war room and creating a war scene. But the purpose of these channels was not to incite war, but to increase TRP by creating war hysteria and fill their pockets with its help. And he got a lot of success in it too. This patriotic channel did not forget to take its traditional advertising break amidst all the important news and debates. After the Pulwama attack, the anchors of all the channels started screaming that now it is necessary to teach a lesson to Pakistan. In a race to stand out from each other, these channels have left no stone unturned to defy all established standards of journalism during this period. Some newspapers also kept flowing in this flow. But there were more of them who are known to be close to the ruling BJP.
What is TRP
TRP stands for Television Rating Point. This shows how much the show is being watched. To know the rating of the channel, a special device called People’s Meter is installed in selected places in big cities. The reason for the importance of TRP is that it is directly related to the earnings of a channel. The higher the TRP of the channel, the more money that channel charges for showing advertisements in the middle of its show ie during the break. The channel on which the audience is short gets fewer advertisements due to falling TRP. On the contrary, the channel which gets the highest TRP, its earnings increase rapidly. This is the reason that every week before the release of the TRP figures, the heartbeats of the actors increase in the channels.
These channels, caught in the ever-increasing competition of TRP, do not care much for the criticisms at the national and international levels. “To stay in the race, we have to do what other channels are doing. Should we save our jobs or journalism?” says a senior TV journalist on condition of anonymity. In many channels, the rise and fall of TRP directly affect the jobs of some top people.
“What is seen sells and what sells survives. We have to work on this formula.”
New paradigms of journalism are being created due to TRP and its earnings. Many journalists say, “Channels have lost the content and format too.” One of the biggest advocates of fairness in journalism, Ravish in his recent articles has been repeatedly appealing to the general audience not to watch unnecessary news and sponsored debates on TV.
The families of many soldiers who lost their lives in the Pulwama attack have also been criticizing TV channels for spreading provocative journalism and war hysteria. Should happen.” She says that sitting in the studio and stirring up war hysteria will not help anyone, but the electronic media has taken a vow of “we will not improve”.
