Counting day: a clear difference between Hindi news and English news. The Hindi channels kept it simple: an anchor, a commentator, one political guest and let the numbers speak for themselves. English news, other than Headlines Today, had large expert panels reflecting every shade of opinion. Times Now had such a rainbow there were more than 10 people at a time. Variety yes, coherence no, as many spoke — or shouted— simultaneously. NDTV and CNN-IBN experimented with academics alongside journalists. A good idea, but did it work? Hmmmn. Meanwhile, Lok Sabha channel buzzed with activity — activity generated not by the election results but a spot of exercising with a former MP on Fitness Mantra: “happiness” it proclaimed “is a tonic — keep smiling”. It’s only after ten that it decided to join the count, that too in armchair fashion with Suneet Tandon. 

Colour schemes and graphics: crucial, what with multiple numbers, rolling text, breaking news all at once. On looks our vote goes to News X (blue and white chart) and Zee News (blue and grey for a variation) as the most eye-soothing, CNN-IBN as the most traditional (blue, red and white), NDTV the most innovative (pale gold and black) and India TV, true to its brand, the most shocking in red, black and white. The graphics were best on NDTV. 

In an election show, the first thing that matters are the numbers: as always, each channel had a different count — DD was particularly slow and Times Now was behind CNN-IBN, Headlines Today or NDTV — but since the leads were clear very early on it didn’t seem to matter.   

... contd.