Mysuru: Over 38 lakh watched Dasara festivities virtually

Mysuru: As many as 38 lakh people witnessed Dasara festivities on social media platforms alone on all 10 days apart from those who watched the proceedings on 26 television channels. The Dasara jumbo savari procession on Monday was witnessed virtually by 5,69,000 people, according to Raju R, assistant director of department of information and public relations (DIPR), who was nodal officer for virtual Dasara arrangements.

"Mysuru district administration in coordination with 'Fusion Minds' and 18-member team of Ravgo fibernet, internet and cloud infrastructure providers led by Vinay Kumar came up with a 'media cloud setup' to live stream the Dasara programmes on YouTube and Facebook pages of DIPR, Mysore district administration and four other private social media platforms. Through this media cloud setup, 26 satellite and local channels also telecast live Dasara programmes," he said.

Out of the 38 lakh viewers, 27 lakh witnessed the programmes on Facebook and 11 lakh on YouTube. Dasara inaugural event at Chamundi hills on October 17 was watched by 10,700 people. The cultural programme on October 17 evening and dance performance by Shubha Dhananjay and team was witnessed by 44,300 people virtually. Flute concert by Vidwan Shashank Subramanyam on October 18 was witnessed by 68,900 people virtually. The special concert on October 21 to pay tribute to noted playback singer S P Balasubramayam was witnessed by the highest number of 10,28,000 virtually. On 22 October concert by Police band and fusion music by Vaarija Sri Venugopal team was witnessed by 2,47,200 people virtually.

Mr Raju clarified, "while Dasara cultural programmes were live streamed on time, the viewers did not exit in between, so viewership recorded of these events was authentic. But for Dasara jumbo savari procession, while we started live streaming an hour in advance, some people exited in between and rejoined once the procession started. So the viewership of Dasara procession is higher than what is recorded," he said.

The data of the content reshared by social media platforms and freelancers with embedded codes is not available. Also viewers of 26 TV channels were not calculated, Mr Raju said.