MUMBAI: ETC channel Punjabi's live telecast of the historic celebration of 400 years of Sri Guru Granth Sahib's installation on 1 September beat Star Sports' live telecast of the India-England match on the same day, claims the channel.

Quoting TAM figures the channel says during its 18 hours live telecast, ETC Channel Punjabi had a share of 54 per cent whereas Star Sports and Star Plus combined channel share was 35 per cent.

According to an official release, ETC Channel Punjabi registered a channel share of 54 per cent while Star Plus and Star Sports had a channel share of 30 per cent and 5 per cent respectively and Sony Entertainment had a share of 11 per cent (Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh and Himachal Pradesh, Total Market, C&S, 15+ABC, All Day) on 1 September. ETC Channel Punjabi can already boast of having more than 80 per cent channel share during its live telecast of Gurbani from Golden Temple, in the morning and evening.

Says ETC Channel Punjabi business head Rabindra Narayan, "This was a historic occasion for all Sikhs and keeping in mind the sentiment we decided to telecast the whole event LIVE so that the entire world could view the historic proceedings from Amritsar on that auspicious day".

"These figures reaffirm the fact that the wisdom of Gurus is more powerful than any game of Cricket or any soap opera," says, programming VP Rajiee M. Shinde. She also adds, "We had deployed 12 cameras to cover the various locations in Amritsar". This itself speaks for the enormity of the coverage on a day when an estimated number of more than 2 million devotees visited the city, including the Prime Minister, President, Dalai Lama, Sri Ravishankar and many other political and religious dignitaries.

ETC Networks Ltd. CEO Jagjit Singh Kohli expressed, "It was a bold decision for us to not to run a single second commercial and thereby let go our day's earnings. But the occasion demanded this sacrifice and our viewers have reasserted their faith in us."