When Prince William and Kate Middleton exchanged vows, they not only spread cheer among British citizens, but also among owners of news channels in India. On Friday, a large number of viewers tuned into Hindi and English news channels to watch the live coverage of the wedding ceremony from Westminister Abbey, London.
According to data available with aMap, an overnight television audience monitoring agency, as many as 42.1 million people in the country tuned in to Hindi and English, news channels, as well as English entertainment channels like BBC and TLC to watch the royal wedding live.
The number of viewers recorded on news channels during the royal wedding is significant if one takes into account the fact that 39 million viewers in India had watched the opening match of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 played between India and Bangladesh on February 19.
The viewership is, however, lower than that of the World Cup finals played in Mumbai between India and Sri Lanka on April 2. As many as 67.6 million people had watched Dhoni and his team lift the World Cup after a gap of 28 years. The viewership recorded that day is the highest ever in the history of Indian television.
The market share of English news channels like NDTV, IBN-7, CNBC during the royal wedding zoomed by as much as 15 per cent on Friday. The overall English news genre accounts for around 1.5 per cent share in the television viewership universe. The royal wedding saw market share of English news channels shoot up to 1.7 per cent on April 29. The market share of Hindi news channels, in the meantime, rose over eight per cent to 8.3 per cent.
Apart from core target group viewers, the royal wedding, aMap says, cut across sections of society, especially creating a huge interest base among women. aMap says viewership among women aged 15 years or above recorded on English news channels in cable and satellite homes increased by 25 per cent.
Jinti Shah, vice-president, aMap, said, “Viewership amongst housewives increased, as they were glued to watch every detail of the wedding ceremony, the designer clothing and the grand affair.”