In an email to one of the stakeholders, BARC, India, claims that its team has completed all development and testing work for the tech comm approved solution.

BARC is currently in the process of completing the necessary due compliance and regulatory processes for the adoption of the increased data reporting requirements, according to the email.

The email was issued on September 27 in response to a request from a news organisation to "immediately disclose TRP statistics for News Genre."

BARC replied in an email obtained by exchange4media that they understood their concerns and that they would continue to be influenced by feedback from its stakeholders. 

“You will also realise that we need to limit ourselves to the sections of your message that directly affect BARC India and have consequently limited our responses germane to them," the letter continues.

The decision to withhold the ratings was not made unilaterally, according to BARC's email. "Our choices are fully guided by industry input and feedback, which comes to us primarily through the Board and Technical Committee, both of which have enough representation from a wide range of our subscribers."

The Technical Committee suggested pausing channel level data for the news genre based on comments and "exigent conditions," according to the statement.

It also clarified that the initial period of the review was for 8-12 weeks, but it has taken longer due to Tech Comm's consultative approach to onboard views of stakeholders and industry participants.

Thanking the stakeholders for their patience, the BARC team stated that it has concluded all development and testing work for the Tech-Comm-approved solution.

"We are now in the process of completing the requisite due compliance and regulatory procedures required for the implementation of the augmented data reporting standards.
 
Rest assured that we will keep all our subscribers posted on developments through our stakeholder bodies and we are committed to meeting the TV viewership data needs of our subscribers," it read.