#e4mExclusive:  ABC forms panel for engaging advertisers to bolster its role as print currency

A day after e4m reported that the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) had constituted a high-level committee—chaired by Aniruddha Haldar of TVS Motor Co.—to address gaps perceived to be discouraging publisher participation, it has now emerged that the Bureau has set up another panel aimed at engaging advertisers, agencies and government bodies to reinforce its position as India’s primary industry-accepted currency of the print media. Through this high-level committee, ABC seeks to encourage advertisers and media buyers to actively consider “ABC-certified circulation data” while planning and evaluating print media investments.

Karunesh Bajaj, Chairman of the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC)-- himself is heading the five-member panel. 

“The Coordination Committee comprises both publisher and non-publisher Council members. The committee will engage on a regular basis with advertising agencies, advertisers, PSUs, and government organisations,” Bajaj, who is also the Executive Vice President – Marketing & Exports at ITC Limited, told e4m.

Bajaj noted further, “Currently, in the absence of any alternative industry-accepted currency, the committee will focus on apprising stakeholders of the rigorous audit processes followed by ABC before certifying circulation figures of its member publications. It will also encourage advertisers and media buyers to consider ABC-certified circulation data in their print media planning and decision making.”

The renewed push comes at a time when the Indian Readership Survey (IRS), long regarded as the print industry’s readership currency, has remained stalled for nearly five years. In September last year, MRUCI had announced plans to conduct a pilot survey to assess the feasibility of physical fieldwork in the post-pandemic environment, particularly across metro markets. However, the pilot survey results are yet to be made public.

Currency is crucial for advertisers as print continues to command relevance in media plans, with several advertisers still allocating roughly 10–15% of their overall advertising budgets to the medium.

Also read: ABC reworks membership norms to widen publisher base in RNI-dominated landscape

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On publishers who opted out

Within the industry, it is widely discussed that several publishers—despite having been ABC members for years—opted out of the audit process, allegedly due to circulation pressures, especially in the post-Covid period.

When asked whether ABC intends to re-engage publishers who were members earlier but later exited, Bajaj said, “The committee will also interact with publishers who were earlier members of ABC, seek their feedback and understand the reasons for their decision of opting out of ABC.”

“This will include assessing whether such decisions are driven by prevailing market conditions or by any specific ABC guidelines that may be constraining them to opt out of audit of certain publications or editions,” he explained.

Bajaj underlined that the intent of this engagement is not merely defensive. “The idea of engaging is not only to defend the audit framework, but also to understand market realities and see where engagement or clarification can help—without diluting the core audit principles that give ABC its credibility,” he said.

Notably, ABC—India’s only audit-based circulation body—is looking to widen its membership and has set up a committee to engage with publishers across the country to bring them on board. Currently, ABC has around 750 publisher members. 

However, the Registrar of Newspapers for India (RNI), which relies largely on documentation-driven data, counts over 21,000 newspapers among its 1.44 lakh registered publications.