When the globe was struck by FIFA fever, we in India were busy calculating the Sensex rise and fall, listening to stock market debates and praying for “achche din” in its actual sense.
Suppressed by corruption and flattened by inflation, urban, semi-urban and rural Indians alike were yearning for a change. Thus, high on expectations index, Budget 2014 (Mr. Narendra Modi’s maiden budget) was the most awaited launch of the year.
This can also be gauged by the fact that a whopping 479 business leaders’ comments appeared on this year’s budget.
To add spice to the budget tale, we observed the comments and opinions coming inexorably from the business sector to ascertain which business leaders’ quote grabbed the highest eyeballs in print media.
For this research exercise, the data required was gathered from the news coverage of the Delhi editions of 5 financial dailies (The Economic Times, Business Standard, The Financial Express, Mint and The Hindu Business Line) and 4 mainline dailies (The Times of India, Hindustan Times, The Hindu and The Indian Express).
At a time when quotes were being showered extensively, Kumar Mangalam Birla of Aditya Birla Group gathered the most coverage for his insightful remarks. He was followed by Adi Godrej (Chairman, Godrej Group) and Rana Kapoor (CEO, Yes Bank), whose views and expectations from the Budget gained major attention.
In Financials too, Kumar Mangalam Birla received the most quotes along with Adi Godrej and Baba N Kalyani.
In Mainline, Rana Kapoor’s quotes were carried the most followed by Kumar Mangalam Birla and Sandesh Kirkire.
The impact of a picture is far more than words written in black and white. Hence, going by these lines, Kumar Mangalam Birla made a huge impact as his photograph was carried the most followed by Adi Godrej (Chairman, Godrej Group) and Sunil Bharti Mittal (Chairman, Bharti Enterprises).
As expected, quotes from leaders of banking and financial firms got the highest coverage both in Mainlines and Financials, which was followed by quotes from consulting and advisory sector and conglomerates.
What remains for us to see is how many of the budget declarations are fulfilled and how much of it benefits the common man (the mango people) and the business honchos.
Authored by: Nisha Rai, Md. Nazir and Fiza Noori, Impact Research & Measurement Pvt. Ltd.
If you enjoyed this article, you can subscribe for free to our weekly event and subscriber alerts.
We have four email alerts in total - covering ESG, PR news, events and awards. Enter your email address below to find out more: