‘How is TV dying if people are consuming content, especially from tier 2, 3 cities?’

At the e4m Impact Digital Influencer Conference 2024, Deepak Dhar, Founder and Group CEO, Banijay Asia and Endemol Shine India, engaged in an insightful conversation with Nawal Ahuja, Co-founder, exchange4media, to discuss how entertainment shapes the society.

Dhar shared how during the beginning years of his career, the Star Network stint acted as a kindergarten in the world of entertainment for him.

“Those were fearless days of television. There was no fear of failure or what's going to happen. Star was the challenger brand back then and not the champion brand. So as a challenger brand you try all punches and that’s what we did. From KBC to the Great Indian Laughter Challenge to Sarabhai vs Sarabhai, most punches really landed well,” he recalled.

According to Dhar, he learnt at Star that it was important to break new ground in the world of entertainment. It doesn’t matter to be a success or failure but it is important to get to the new frontier, he said.

Speaking about whether the same content works on TV and digital, Dhar explained that generally the character is black, white or grey, and the story revolves around that one character. The packaging may change based on whether it's TV or OTT but essentially it's more about the story, the character.

Asked about recent headlines on ‘the death of TV’ and the multiple consolidations, mergers and acquisitions in the industry, Dhar said that “if things are going through the roof for Free TV, how is TV dying?”

“If people are consuming that kind of content, and especially people from tier 2 and 3 cities, how is TV dying? Definitely, there is very little innovation on the pay TV side and this is something we as creators, producers, networks, we need to address otherwise we would be fast tracking the migration to OTT,” he said.

As per Dhar, over time TV may become like print where it exists as an option and people who like to consume on it will still opt to watch content on TV.

Coming to theatres, not many movies have given thronging business to the multiplexes, except the nostalgic reruns of old classics, which has given a boost to the revenues. Given how stressed the business already is on the cinema side, Dhar believes that people in the business really need to innovate. They need to go back to the drawing boards and talk about key markets, target audiences and how to cater to these target audiences.

“Case in point, Narcos, which appealed to a certain market and then went global. Similarly, Squid Games. We have to create that one show in Gujarati that goes all over India because it's impossible today to find that one story that fits all,” Dhar added.

Another learning that proves the ‘One size doesn’t fit all’ theory is back in 2005 when the rights of Big Brother were picked, there were zero takers for it. Dhar shared, “I went to every network, every channel and the industry considered it to be very risky for Indian TV at that time. We adapted that show, localised it and made it very culturally relevant for India. Today, we now produce almost 800 days of Bigg Boss in India, that too in seven different languages.”

But even though India is the content factory of the world, we haven’t been able to make a Squid Game or Narcos-level show. Dhar mentioned that it isn’t like “we aren't capable of doing so but every content market has a timing”.

“It was Pakistani content once, then Israeli content, then Turkish serials took off, and recently Korean content is topping the charts. With creations like Natu Natu and The Elephant Whisperers racing Oscars, our time is now. It's time that Indian stories now travel globally,” he said.

Dhar also believes the way India is placed geopolitically now, that will have a reflection on the content that is being consumed. The Indian diaspora is huge and a great spokesperson in every different market to be India’s ambassadors there.