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What’s the story?
The title decider game of the Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) Season 5 has become the highest rated non-cricket sports event in India surpassing PV Sindhu's Rio Olympics summit clash against Carolina Marin.
According to a release issued by Star Sports, the PKL 5 final amassed 26.2 million average impressions on TV, while the Sindhu-Marin clash garnered an average viewership of 17.2 million, which earlier held the record.
The tournament, after a stellar opening in Hyderabad, was played across 12 cities, with the final being held in Chennai. At the end of Season 5, gross impressions for India’s most watched non-cricketing league stand at 313 million with a watch time of 100 billion minutes, as stated in the release.
In case you didn’t know
Newcomers Gujarat Fortunegiants faced Patna Pirates in the final which took place in Chennai on October 28. It was telecast on Star Sports 2/1 Hindi/1 Tamil, Star Sports 1HD/2 HD and Star Sports First. The Pirates beat Fortunegiants 55-38 to seal their third Pro Kabaddi title.
The heart of the matter
Kabaddi in India has been on an upward move ever since the Pro Kabaddi League was launched in 2014. There has been huge fan following for the sport which was once considered a rural game. Even the 2016 Kabaddi World Cup, hosted by India, had become the most watched non-cricket event in Indian sports history. So from that point of view, it’s not at all a surprise that PKL garnered earth-shattering Television Rating Points (TRP).
On top of the list is the final of the IPL Season 10, which had 39.4 million average impressions. The PKL 4 final stands with 15.2 million while the Indian Super League Season 3 final had 15 million.
What’s next?
These kinds of records will be broken time and again in the future as the Indian audience has taken a liking to the sport offers a numerous number of twists in every fixture.
Author’s take
PKL’s official broadcaster, Star Sports, have always given priority to this league, and allotted carpet coverage for the matches. This time four new teams were added to the roaster which already had eight sides, making PKL the biggest sports league of the nation.
The future is very bright for this game and as veteran kabaddi player Anup Kumar said, it may catch up with cricket very soon.
