Ministry allows BARC to share raw-level measurement data with broadcasters

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The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) has asked audience measurement body Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to share raw-level audience measurement data with broadcasters, according to a report by The Economic Times (ET). BARC had requested the MIB permission to share audience measurement Raw Level Data (RLD) with broadcasters. BARC already shares this data with advertisers and media agencies.  

The ministry acknowledged that the BARC has scaled up the panel homes by about 85 per cent, from 30,000 to 55,000 and the RLD data has been anonymised to ensure the secrecy and integrity of the panel homes.

"BARC may share raw level data up to the preceding week, i.e., RLD data of the viewership for the W-1st week when the TRP is being reported for the Wth week, with the broadcasters in a transparent and equitable manner while ensuring that the integrity and confidentiality of the BARC panels are maintained at all times," the ministry said in a letter to BARC.

According to experts, raw-level audience measurement data will provide broadcasters with more information about the viewing habits of consumers. 'Policy Guidelines for Television Rating Agencies in India' states that data generated by BARC should be made available to all interested stakeholders in a transparent and equitable manner.

The ministry had asked the measurement agency to release viewership ratings of news channels with immediate effect. BARC was supposed to provide data for the genre for the past three months, in a monthly format. In October 2020, BARC suspended ratings following allegations that they were manipulated by some TV channel

What is BARC?

Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) is an industry body founded by stakeholder bodies representing broadcasters, advertisers, and media agencies, providing data on television audience measurement. BARC's prime objective is to measure and analyse TV viewership data. BARC was formed as an alternative to Nielsen and Kantar Media's TAM Media Research.

How does BARC measure TRPs?

BARC measures Television Rating Point (TRP) using "BAR-O-meters. The Television Rating Point (TRP) is the metric marketing and advertising agencies use to evaluate viewership. BARC employs audio watermark technology to measure the viewership of TV channels. Before the process of broadcast, audio watermarking embeds audio watermarks in video content. These watermarks are inaudible to the human ear but can decoded to measure viewership data.

Republic TV and fake TRP case

According to a chargesheet filed by the Mumbai Police, TV anchor Arnab Goswami illegally tampered with the TRPs in connivance with the then BARC CEO Partho Dasgupta to improve ratings of Republic TV channels and paid him for his help. Between June 2017 and March 2018, when Dasgupta was working with the BARC, the TRP ratings of an English news channel were illegally manipulated so that they fell below the TRPs of Republic TV channels, which resulted in Rs 431 crore loss to that channel, police said.

BARC revised its processes and protocols and made changes in the governance structure, following recommendations of the TRP committee constituted in November 2020 in the wake of the fake TRP scam.