71 percent viewers watched sports in Hindi

After Hindi, Bangla & Tamil  up next

English was the language of sports commentary when it started in India in the early 1940s on All India Radio. The listenership was limited to the English-speaking class. It was in the late 1950s that cricket commentary in Hindi made a beginning. Commentary in the language of the people took the game of cricket to the hinterlands.

The dominance of sports commentary in Hindi continued till the mid-1980s. Live commentary of India winning the 1975 Hockey World Cup & the 1983 cricket world cup were heard by most cricket fans in India in Hindi.

For the older generation, the names of commentators in Hindi such as Jasdev Singh, Suresh Saraiya, Narottam Puri and Ravi Chaturvedi still bring back memories of the 1970s and early 1980s when words created action happening on the cricket field.

Ten Sports network's India vs South Africa series coverage plan

Three ODIs and two Test matches India’s tour of South Africa series will be live on Ten Sports in Hindi & Ten Cricket and  Ten HD in English. Ten Sports will also be monetising the Internet rights for the series, as it will be live streaming the matches on its website.

“With the viewer becoming more and more demanding like any other nation, and rightfully so, there is a viewer base that is looking forward to Hindi commentary and then the usual English commentary feed. Thus, we are only trying to reach out and satisfy the needs of our viewers and keep everyone glued to the action being played out on their screens in the language of their preference.” says Rajesh Sethi, CEO of Ten Sports Network.