Doordarshan delights with no ad-breaks during CWG closing ceremony - India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

With no commercial breaks’ interruptions to spoil the mood as it did during the opening ceremony, for people sitting at home and watching today’s fabulous and riveting closing ceremony of the XIX Commonwealth Games live on Doordarshan must have been a pleasant experience. Though 38 cameras on the ground covered the event, aerial coverage through a helicopter was also provided of the closing ceremony. Ahead of the closing show, the Central Government had conveyed it to the public broadcaster not to air a single commercial during the live telecast of the closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games on Thursday. The directive had been made just days after Doordarshan raised advertising rates for the event to Rs.2.5 lakh for 10 seconds. Talking to an English daily, Aruna Sharma, Director General of Doordarshan, stated: “The government has asked us not to put ads in the middle of the closing ceremony telecast.” It may be recalled that Doordarshan had deferred the telecast of the opening ceremony of the Games on Oct.3 by about half an hour. By the time it got over, because of commercial breaks during the event, the “live” show for television viewers was still on when many people had already reached home after attending the ceremony. On Oct.3, the opening ceremony had attracted 7.4 million television viewers as per TAM Media Research numbers.