The language media trails English media on the Internet in India. This is in sharp contrast to the traditional media where the numbers are in favour of language media.
This has been revealed in the comScore.com report on India’s daily readership of online news and information that was released today. The report lists only three language properties in the top 20 news and information sites on the net.
These are:
- Jagran sites, which are ranked seventh
- Bhaskar.com, which is ranked 14th; and
- Navbharat Times , which is ranked 19th.
All three incidentally are the news sites of Hindi language newspapers.
These findings provide an important insight into the consumption of news and information on the net. The two most important conclusions that can be drawn from the report are:
1. Internet is still an elite activity in India, and is still to percolate down to the non-English speaking masses.
2. The numbers are yet to come in non-Hindi regional languages.
Another important finding of the report is the sharp jump in the significant growth in the daily readership of news and information content in the past year.
The average of number daily visitors to news sites have grown from 7 million to 9.4 million –a jump of 34% from August 2012 to August 2013.
The visitors are also spending more time on news sites. The average time spent has grown to 41.6 minutes from 31.6
minutes in August last year. This is a good indication. It shows that the online news consumption is going up in India.
The Times of India continues to be clear leader with 12.7 million visitors.