'Ramayan' retelecast garners highest ratings for a Hindi show since 2015

Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan, which retuned to DD National during the 21-day nation-wide lockdown, garnered the highest-ever rating for a Hindi General Entertainment Channel (GEC) programme since 2015 when the Broadcasting Audience Research Council (BARC) started measuring the television audience, an official statement released by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on Thursday said.

Ramayan's repeat telecast tops the charts 

Doordarshan has been entertaining people who are keeping themselves at home, by broadcasting the old classics. In the wake of the countrywide lockdown for 21 days to deal with Covid-19 outbreak, the public service broadcaster decided to retelecast the mythological serial of the 80s – Ramayan and Mahabharat.

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On public demand, Doordarshan has also reintroduced some of its other famous serials like Shaktimaan, Shriman Shrimati, Chanakya, Dekh Bhai Dekh, Buniyaad, Circus and Byomkesh Bakshi on DD National and along with Mahabharat, it has also reintroduced Alif Laila and Upanishad Ganga on DD Bharati, the statement said.

Ramayan was back on television on last Saturday, recalling for many those epic mornings an age ago when entire families, and even neighbours, gathered before clunky television boxes for their weekly fix of television and religion.

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The streets were empty, as they were nearly three decades ago when Ramanand Sagar’s serial that brought to life in vivid colour the story of the noble prince and his 14-year exile began airing every Sunday. Then, it was about people glued to television screens, some even praying before it, planning their day around that one hour a week and making sure they go nowhere. Now, it is about a lockdown in a high tech efficient world of 24-hour entertainment as India and the world battle the coronavirus pandemic. The government’s announcement that it would rerun the show on DD National at 9 am and 9 pm every day brought back nostalgia for times that were simpler and TV viewing was about community.

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