Indian viewers have once again proved cricket is a religion in India and when the arch rivals — India and Pakistan — go head-on, all charts go haywire.The Champions Trophy one day international ( ODI ) match played between India and Pakistan on June 4, reached over 20 crore people, or in other words, registered a cumulative reach of 201 million. To put the viewership in perspective, the entire Indian Premier League ( IPL ) 2017 clocked a cumulative reach of around 411 million, across 60 matches over the one and a-half-month period.In terms of viewership, the India-Pakistan match clocked a whopping 47.45 million impressions (total number of viewers at any time during the broadcast of the match) according to BARC India, the television viewership monitoring agency. This is the highest viewership for any ODI since the inception of BARC.Basabdatta Chowdhury, national COO at Publicis Groupe-owned media buying firm Starcom India, said that a match between India and Pakistan was expected to attract big numbers. “We were expecting high ratings for this match. It would have been a surprise in case viewership was low. Having said that, the reach of 201 million has surpassed our expectations.”The match was aired on four channels of the Star Sports network and DD National.A Star India spokesperson said, “ICC Champions Trophy 2017 has been an impressive event in terms of scale, reach and following. With the India-Pakistan match setting a new viewership record on the Star Sports network, becoming the highest rated ODI match in BARC history, this edition of the CT17 has validated that there is nothing bigger than cricket for Indian audiences.”Incidentally, India versus Sri Lanka match also fared well and clocked 34 million impressions.