Business Standard

Punjabi to Bangla: TV channels bet on regional languages for success

Bhojpuri, Punjabi, Gujarati, Odia are among the new languages driving growth and action in the television market

television
Premium

There is a push for more original programmes in under-served markets

Vanita Kohli-Khandekar New Delhi
What is Punjabiyat? What touches Punjabi audiences the most?

Prathyusha Agarwal, chief consumer officer of Zee Entertainment, said that in the run-up to the launch of Zee Punjabi in 2020, “we spent three months in 2018 trying to understand the passions in Punjab”. 

They were love for the army, stories of partition, and strength of Punjabi women, which then came to be reflected in shows on Zee Punjabi. The channel has done well to gain a (claimed) third of the small Punjabi general entertainment market. 

Similar intense exercises in understanding movie-viewing habits went into Zee Biskope (Bhojpuri, January), Zee Thirai

What you get on BS Premium?

  • Unlock 30+ premium stories daily hand-picked by our editors, across devices on browser and app.
  • Pick your 5 favourite companies, get a daily email with all news updates on them.
  • Full access to our intuitive epaper - clip, save, share articles from any device; newspaper archives from 2006.
  • Preferential invites to Business Standard events.
  • Curated newsletters on markets, personal finance, policy & politics, start-ups, technology, and more.
VIEW ALL FAQs

Need More Information - write to us at assist@bsmail.in