Rise of OTT Bengali Originals: Niche Content for the Diverse Audiences

Introduction

The emergence of Covid 19 pandemic raised a serious global threat as governments across the world executed lockdowns and followed strong measures like social distancing to curb the propagation of the virus leading to interruption in free and regular movements for millions of individuals. Confined within the four walls and physically being separated from families, well-wishers, and friends and the rise of unemployment, pay cuts alongside the relentless fear of catching and avoiding the disease were the emerging issues. Covid 19 brought numerous alterations at a fast leap and such formed rules were termed as the new normal (Bhattacharyya, 2020) The pandemic situation, and the imposition of lockdown specifically, has changed the way we avail entertainment. The practice has gradually shifted from watching films in theatres to viewing them on OTT platforms. From films premiering exclusively on such platforms to accessing live telecasts of sporting events such as IPL have drawn a significant proportion of viewers toward OTT entertainment. The presence of locally produced web series in the list of the content offered by platforms has further accelerated acceptance of OTTs, especially among the technologically sound millennials and Gen Z. A High level of conversion to OTT from DTH or cable television subscriptions has been noticed among young viewers even before the pandemic (Subramanian, 2022)

Once the pandemic ebbed, the viewing tendency was further amplified with the addition of services offered by OTTs over cable television or DTH. The option of live streaming and viewing accessibility via smartphones has enabled audiences to view their preferred content in different languages and diverse content, viewing on-demand even when they are on the move. Customers are also shifting their preferences from paid television subscriptions to online-based streaming services. According to a report published by Boston Consulting Group content market of OTT platforms in India has reached a nuanced point. It is expected to touch the market proportion of $5 billion by 2023. In another research conducted by Phando Corp, the MAUs (Monthly Active Users) in the video segment of OTT in India have grown exponentially, at 300 percent, from 2019 and clocked 680 million in the year 2021. The consumption share reached 80 percent with the inclusion of Tier II and III cities and rural pockets (Subramanian, 2022).

In general, the OTT online streaming landscape can be separated into four sections: International OTT platforms trailing with local regional languages, local OTT players trying to retain a position over the regional OTT userbase, central regional OTTs mapping their niche in 3 or 4 languages and region-wise content aggregators. Apart from this, there are DTH services and telecom operators such as Jio Cinema, Vodafone Play, and Tata Sky Binge which offer regional OTT content through partnership (Agarwal, 2020). Hindi language content has a dominating presence across major Indian OTT platforms. However, there are large chunks of unmapped regional OTT platforms that are targeting local audiences, and their dominance is on the rise. Unlike the foremost OTT players, who target vast and varied audiences, the regional OTT operators have carved a niche for themselves, serving local viewers with local language content. (Rising Kashmir, 2022). Over the last few several OTT players like Disney+Hotstar, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, ZEE5, Mubi, YouTube, Jio Cinema, and MX Player have surfaced as prime streamers of regional video content. There are also regional OTT players like Addatimes, Hoichoi, Manorama Max, Sun NXT, Prime Flix, and Ullu that are purely capitalizing on regional content. These platforms use the English language as a medium of default display on their interface but do not provide any English language content (Agarwal, 2020)