India’s media machine is accelerating while the world slows to a crawl: PwC’s Rajesh Sethi

MUMBAI: India’s sports and media ecosystem is having a blockbuster year, but behind the flashy scoreboards lie silent battles for talent, revenue stability and technological readiness. Cricket continues to rule the nation, with women’s sport finally seizing its overdue spotlight, yet the real power shift is happening online.

Rajesh Sethi, partner and leader for media, entertainment and sports at PwC India, says the Women’s Premier League may have dazzled screens, but the sector’s biggest hurdles rarely make headlines. “Infrastructure gaps at smaller venues are holding back production quality and long-term talent pipelines,” he notes. Add piracy, soaring media rights fees and viewer fatigue from juggling multiple streaming subscriptions, and suddenly the golden age of sports broadcasting looks more like a high-wire act.

Advertising volatility has not helped either. The collapse in real-money gaming spending left cricket broadcasters scrambling to fill revenue gaps. Scheduling clashes have stretched resources thin. And as India demands more women in commentary boxes and broadcast crews, the professional talent pool has failed to keep pace, leaving broadcasters reliant on a tiny group of voices.

If there is a clear winner this year, Sethi says it is digital streaming. “OTT platforms drew record audiences with exclusive sports rights. Mobile-first access is fuelling adoption in urban and semi-urban markets, while features like multi-camera angles and live stats keep fans glued,” he explains. With advertisers chasing precision and younger fans ditching appointment TV, digital has become the new centre of gravity.

TV, though, is no relic. It remains the go-to for mass reach, especially in rural India, but investors are following the growth curves, not nostalgia. “Television is steady, but OTT is where the innovation and upside lie,” says Sethi.

Print, meanwhile, refuses to follow the global script. With a projected 3.3 per cent rise, the old ink-and-paper workhorse is thriving in India’s tier-2 and tier-3 cities. “Trust in print is extremely high. Rising literacy is driving readership, especially where newspapers symbolise prestige for first-generation literate households,” Sethi points out. Hyper-local content and cost-effective advertising keep the presses rolling.

And then there is AI, hyped, hustled and somehow still half-baked. Sethi argues that India’s media firms are stuck in “proof-of-concept purgatory”. “AI adoption must move beyond isolated pilots. Content creation sometimes lacks cultural nuance and regional language depth. Advertising personalisation misfires. Piracy enforcement needs teeth.” His prescription is clear. Industry-wide integration, governance frameworks and AI Centres of Excellence to kill fragmentation.

So, how does he sum up the year? In one word: transformative. Digital-first strategies have moved from ambition to inevitability. Regional and hyper-local content is no longer side content. It is the content. And the business model itself is mutating at speed.

India is not just rewriting the playbook. It is changing the game, and the whistle has only just blown for the first half. The next season will be unmissable.