Ram Kisan Yadav, aka Baba Ramdev, has been one of the most public figures in India since he started revolving his stomach on Sanskar TV in 2002.

As Priyanka Pathak-Narain notes in her closely-researched book, according to the Broadcast Audience Research Council, Patanjali doubled its weekly ad insertion “from 11,897 in the first week of January 2016 to 24,050 in the week of 25 March. During the same period, Ramdev appeared 234,934 times across TV channels, which means he was on air every 30 seconds on one channel or another.” Patanajali Ayurveda Limited remains one of the top ...