India’s TV ratings body Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India on Monday said it will be restarting issuing data on news channels from mid-March, over 17 months after suspending it.

In a statement, BARC India said the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has given a directive to resume the release of data for individual news channels.

“BARC India is currently working towards ensuring the seamless release of individual news channel data and intends to commence release with effect from our reporting Week 10, 2022. As per our reporting cycle, this data will be released to the market on Thursday, 17th March 2022,” PTI quoted from a BARC India statement on Monday.

BARC India had in October 2020 had “temporarily suspended” the ratings on the news genre following alleged irregularities of data manipulations.

The data will be released as per the Augmented Data Reporting Standards (ADRS) for News and Special Interest genres, BARC India said, adding that clients and stakeholders have been communicated about the same.

The ADRS entail the reporting of audience estimates for News and Special Interest genre channels on a four-week rolling average basis, which would be released regularly every week along with the estimates for all other channels. All viewership data will be published on the same YUMI platform that all its subscribers use, the statement said.

“…we believe we have a statistically sound and effective solution which helps augment the robustness of the data and reporting, which we had set out to do,” the statement added.

In a separate communication to its subscribers, BARC India, also detailed on the way the audience data would be made available, including Customised Events Report or CERs (defined as reporting of an event in a single day) in a financial year, which is  three non-transferable CERs issued per quarter, to each channel, based on their specific request.

These reports would be based on unrolled data for “events” such as special news events, premiere shows, etc. Broadcasters can use the CERs for the purpose of social/marketing communications, sharing with trade/media. CERs will be made available from Week 14 data release.

Further it said that subscribers should note that no channel-level estimates, rolled or unrolled, will be provided for the period, Week 40, 2020 till Week 48, 2021, for the News genre.

It also urged all subscribers to clear all outstanding dues prior to the  date of release of data that has been finalsied.

“Please also note that those subscribers who choose to opt-out and not have their past data released, will also need to pay their subscription fees for the period from Week 40, 2020,: it said.

The ADRS for News and Special Interest genre channels have been “carefully thought through, putting industry needs at the heart of the revised methodology while maintaining statistical integrity”, the agency said, adding the solution has been “adequately tested and is now ready to be adopted into BARC’s measurement system”.

“While we have provided an elaborate understanding on the way forward, should you have any questions, other than on the past data release, or opting out from receiving the same, please note that BARC India will be holding webinars in the coming week to address any of your queries around the methodology and the review process adopted in arriving at the Augmented Data Reporting Standards.

Post these webinars, should there be any residual questions unanswered, we will try and resolve the same for you in the run up to the data release on 17th March 2022,” it concluded.