Motorists seeking relief from traffic jams in India?s metropolitan areas remember, wistfully, the late 1980s when a popular television show, Ramayan, could clear the streets and freeze all movement across the land. Now, a televisual depiction of this great Indian epic is back on the small screen, and not just once every week but every weekday, its launch announced with immense fanfare as part of an entirely new TV channel?s launch package. Motorists, however, seem to be out of luck this time round. Indian streets remain as densely clogged as ever, even if urban civic services have reason to heave a silent sigh of relief; they are not under pressure from local politicians to ensure that tap-water does not run out in millions of homes where a pre-watch bath is de rigeur to maintain the sanctity of the living room space to be ennobled at the appointed hour by the programme?s reception, as happened last time round. In fact, most of the thronging crowds that make up India?s vast TV audience?and there are about seven TV sets today for every unit in the late 1980s?seem to be blissfully unaware of this mythological show having rejoined the airwaves. It has recorded a TRP score of only 2 at its peak. This is less than what a cricket match or cinema blockbuster records these days, and is a ship-in-the-night figure in comparison with the phenomenal viewership records set by the original show telecast by the state-run broadcaster Doordarshan all those years ago. Yet, the new show?s broadcaster is proud of its success, since it has helped the new channel break into the top four of the entertainment bulge bracket.
Is this the stuff of TV triumph nowadays? It sure seems to be. Pin this on viewership fragmentation. Doordarshan was all there was to watch on TV in the good old days of clear streets. Now, there are over 200 satellite channels watched in India, tiring out your channel-zapping thumb, with new ones going on air every few weeks. Audience attention is getting sliced and diced finer and finer in the process, with a TRP figure anywhere close to 1 enough to attract advertisers. But should there not to be a market limit to this frenetic fragmentation? By the look of it, no. Pin this on Indian diversity. Or, perhaps, on a media model that traces middle-class predilections instead of leading them.