Subhash Chandra‘s Zee has, like Raghav Bahl‘s TV18, always been a smart valuations player, forming subsidiaries, leaking information, etc to keep the stock in the news and drive its value up. In September 2018, Chandra gave a long, supersoft interview to The Hindu, apropos nothing, in which he railed against Mukesh Ambani‘s Reliance Jio, even…
Tag Archives: TV18
‘Has media blacked out RIL takeover of TV18?’
As India’s biggest business house Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) goes through the motions of formally taking complete control of one of India’s biggest TV networks, Network 18, the veteran journalist and commentator Kuldip Nayar writes in Deccan Herald: “I was not surprised when television channels did not cover the taking over of a large TV…
‘Media freedom bleaker with Ambani domination’
The takeover of Network 18 group with its myriad news, business and entertainment channels has received scant review in the Indian media, but the author Pankaj Mishra bells the cat in Bloomberg View: “There is no denying that the future of media freedom in India looks even bleaker than ever after Mukesh Ambani’s Silvio Berlusconi-style…
WaPo, Amazon, HT, and the Reliance-TV18 deal
There was plenty of buzz about the Washington Post building being sold to shore up the books. But when the paper’s staff was convened for a meeting on the afternoon of August 5, they were in for a shock: the family-owned newspaper itself was being sold. The sale, to Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com,…
‘Can the media find a middle ground on Modi?’
CNN-IBN editor in-chief Rajdeep Sardesai in his nationally syndicated column, in the Hindustan Times: “The mainstream media has always had a more uneven relationship with Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi. Modi’s acolytes would like to suggest that the mainstream media has always been anti-Modi and has hounded the BJP’s rising star with a ferocity that…
Bombay Press Club blasts ‘Forbes India’ purge
The Press Club of Bombay has reacted to the “termination” of services of Forbes India editor Indrajit Gupta, and the “resignation” of his colleagues Charles Assisi, Shishir Prasad and Dinesh Krishnan by the magazine’s India franchisee, Network 18. The Club has termed the manner of the dismissals of the four journalists “nothing short of shameful”,…
How the ‘Forbes India’ editors were forced out
SHARANYA KANVILKAR writes from Bombay: The abrupt exit last week of the top four editorial heads of the business magazine Forbes India, including of its editor Indrajit Gupta, has swung the spotlight once again on the questionable—but rarely ever questioned—human resources (HR) policies and practices in Indian media houses. In this case, one of India’s…
ET Now anchor to wed ex-cricketer’s son
From the gossip columns of Pune Mirror, glad tidings on former CNBC TV18 and current ET Now anchor, Ayesha Faridi: “Marriage bells are ringing for Dilip and Manali Vengsarkar’s son Nakul. Your diarist has learnt that the 31-year-old architect and interior designer will be tying the knot with TV anchor Ayesha Faridi on April 27.…
Shekhar Gupta storms into India Today powerlist
Thirteen out of India Today magazine’s 2013 ranking of the 50 most powerful people in India have interests in the media, but only two of them (former Indian Express editor Arun Shourie, Times Now editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, Indian Express editor-in-chief Shekhar Gupta) are pure-play journalists. The chairman of the press council of India, Justice Markandey…
The Ambani brothers, TOI, Medianet & paid news
The “reverse-swing” done on Zee News by Jindal Steel is one of the most intriguing media stories in recent memory. The steel company says it is suing the Subhash Chandra-owned network for Rs 200 crore for the demand of Rs 100 crore in lieu of advertisements allegedly made by its editors, Sudhir Chaudhary and Sameer…
Good news: ‘Media sector is a sunrise sector’
What was bazaar speculation for quite a while is now a matter of record. Aroon Purie, the bossman of the India Today group, has divested over a quarter of his holding in Living Media India Limited, in favour of one of India’s richest men, Kumar Mangalam Birla for an undisclosed sum (Business Standard reports that…
EPW on the RIL-ETV-TV18 deal-within-a-deal
In the latest issue of the Economic & Political Weekly, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta and Subi Chaturvedi weigh in on the nearly forgotten RIL-ETV-TV18 deal, which gives India’s biggest business house control over India’s biggest business news channel, a clutch of news channels, online properties and magazines: “If international best practices are to be followed, cross-media…
ET joins Mint, has questions on RIL-TV18 deal
Two days after Mint front-paged a story that SEBI was looking into the Reliance-Network18/TV18-ETV deal, the country’s biggest business newspaper, The Economic Times has joined force. A story on page 9 of ET, headlined “Will the RIL-TV18 deal trigger takeover code?“, says SEBI “may ask for details” about Reliance funding Network18/TV18 to help it purchase…
Mint says SEBI looking into RIL-TV18-ETV deal
Finally, some critical coverage of the Reliance-Network18/TV18-ETV deal in the business media. Mint, the business newspaper from the Hindustan Times stable, has a story in today’s issue that the stock market regulator, SEBI, is looking into RIL’s financial statements and reports to see if the company had divulged its holding or investment in ETV before…
Will RIL-TV18-ETV deal win SEBI, CCI approval?
PRITAM SENGUPTA in New Delhi and KEERTHI PRATIPATI in Hyderabad write: Media criticism in India, especially in the so-called mainstream media, has never been much to write home about. Operating on the principle that writing on another media house or media professional means exposing yourself to the same danger in the future, proprietors, promoters and…
Why hasn’t India thrown up a media mogul?
Indian media houses, promoters and practitioners are gung-ho about foreign direct investment (FDI) in all sectors except the media, under the specious argument that the media is not a “commodity”, etc. Media barons who justify the worst excesses of modern Indian media under the this-is-what-the-consumer-wants logic, somehow find it convenient to block FDI in media…
Rajeev Chandrasekhar picking up Eenadu TV?
For a paper which turns its nose at news about the rest of the media, The Times of India has a strange item on its business page, news of the mobile phone entrepreneur turned member of Parliament, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, evincing some interest in Ramoji Rao‘s Eenadu television chain in Andhra Pradesh. The ToI report comes…
How serious is the trouble at CNBC & CNN-IBN?
Raghav Bahl‘s Network 18 group has restructured its business plan. Again. All the loss-making broadcast businesses—CNBC TV18, CNN-IBN, IBN7, etc—are under one roof, and the digital and publishing initiatives—moneycontrol.com, Infomedia, etc—under another. Debashis Basu writes in the personal finance magazine Moneylife that this is an old trick aimed at buying time and raising money by…
10 media barons in India Today power list of 50
Ronnie Screwvala of UTV, and Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy of NDTV, are the three prominent media names missing in India Today magazine’s annual ranking of the 50 most powerful people in India for the year of the lord, 2010. Otherwise, this year’s list comprise the usual barons: Samir Jain and Vineet Jain of The…
The barbs that resulted in a Rs 500 crore lawsuit
Udayan Mukherjee of CNBC-TV18 letting fly at rival channel “No. 4”, in other words Bloomberg, on the latter’s claims of its showing on budget day. Bloomberg has now sued the CNBC-TV18 managing editor, but not his employers CNBC TV18, for a round figure of Rs 500 crore. Mukherjee’s lawyers, clearly aurally challenged, deny any “direct…
IJR 