India's BARC Appoints Planning Committee

In India, the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) has formed a three-member Technical Committee (TechComm), tasked with drawing up a roadmap for the establishment of an audience metrics system.

The committee, comprising IPG Mediabrands CEO Shashi Sinha, media research veteran Paritosh Joshi, and Smita Bhosale of Hindustan Unilever, and its role has been defined by BARC's Chairman Punit Goenka.

BARC was established in 2010 to act as an umbrella organisation which oversees and controls the television audience measurement system in India. Earlier this year, the organisation linked with the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF), the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA) and the Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) to act as a joint body which will evaluate the sector's research needs.

In a statement, Sinha (pictured), who is Chairman of the committee, said: 'Setting up of the technical committee is very important for the push of BARC. TechComm will make all the recommendations, in terms of what should be done and how the sampling should be done, but the final decision will be taken by BARC board.'

Joshi is also the Head of the Readership Studies Council of India's Technical Committee, while Bhosale previously sat on the Board of Media Research Users Council (MRUC).