So far the Bachchan show is ahead in the viewer ship stakes, closely trailed by Salman's Bigg Boss

With Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar and Salman Khan reigning prime time on the small screen, the channel viewership ratings war is heating up.

Launch tales

Though Colors' Khatron Ke Khiladi (hosted by Priyanka Chopra) had the highest opening, it has been overtaken by the Amitabh Bachchan-anchored Kaun Banega Crorepati 4 (it airs on Sony) that fetched an opening of 6.2 TVRs (television viewership ratings).

Sony states their show is the most successful launch in recent times on Indian television.

Comparatively, the Salman Khan-hosted Bigg Boss 4 on Colors had an opening of 4.8 TVRs. The Akshay Kumar judged culinary show MasterChef on Star Plus could garner only 2.6 points.

Moreover, KBC's first week average of 5.3 TVRs is also the highest recorded for any non-fiction show over the last year.

This means that one in every three Indians chose to watch KBC during prime time, with the show delivering a 32 per cent reach in the four days of its first week run.

The show's widely anticipated opening episode reached 17.2 per cent of C&S (cable and satellite) audience in the Hindi speaking markets.

But according to Colors, the launch rating 4.8 for Bigg Boss was for a three hour episode versus KBC's one an half hour show rated 6.1 (they state it is not 6.2 as Sony claims).

While the launch rating of MasterChef of 2.6 was pitted against the entry of The Great Khali at 4.2.

What the stars are paid...

Salman Khan is being paid approximately Rs 15 crore for Bigg Boss. This means he gets Rs 1 crore for every Friday and Saturday he appears on the show

Amitabh Bachchan is also being paid over Rs 1 crore for every episode. He features four times a week from Monday to Thursday.

Akshay Kumar judges MasterChef on the weekends and also earns over a crore per episode.