NEW DELHI: India TV editorial director Qamar Waheed Naqvi's resignation over an allegedly "fixed" interview of BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi acquired deep political overtones on Tuesday with Congress claiming that it showed the kind of pressures journalists faced from BJP. AAP was also active on the social media congratulating Naqvi for his "courage".
Congress recalled the police complaint of a senior journalist of the Hindu after she received got threat calls for a piece she wrote on Modi late last year. "This is the trailer of the good days that BJP advertisements are promising" said the party's media chief Ajay Maken.
Naqvi quit on April 13, hours after Modi was featured in Aap Ki Adalat on the evening of April 12. The interview programme is hosted by India TV chairman Sharma. The resignation came amidst accusations that the channel's Modi interview resembled a "public relations exercise."
Naqvi could not be reached for comment despite repeated attempts on his phone and e-mail. However, on Tuesday in obvious reaction to supportive statements of Congress and AAP, he tweeted, "I request politicians to stay away from my resignation episode.''
Sources in India TV said that the channel's pro-Modi bias was clear in the news bulletin line up with the pieces loaded heavily in favour of BJP. "If there were 10 negative stories against Rahul Gandhi or Arvind Kejriwal, there would be one against Modi," a source with the channel said.
He said Naqvi had expressed his reservations to Sharma on several occasions. Channel sources also pointed out that Naqvi had expressed the apprehension about the channel's alleged bias before he was hired, but was assured that India TV wanted to move away from being a "sensational, soap-opera driven channel to a serious news channel."
Denying that there was any political bias Sharma told TOI, "I don't want to comment on this but I would only like to point out that we are doing an election special on Aap ki Adalat and sought interviews from Congress leaders Sonia and Rahul Gandhi and Narendra Modi...we were able to confirm Modi and not the others despite several attempts."
He added: "We have already completed interviews of various political parties including Akhilesh Yadav and Raj Thackeray. The programs have been in the works for the last three months. In fact, we were expected to shoot with Modi on April 7 but it was cancelled and we only managed to shoot on April 10."
Management sources said that the Modi interview was just an alibi for Naqvi when actually he was under pressure for lack of performance. "The channel had made heavy investments in the last few months in infrastructure and hires. But it continued to remain number three. The pressure was telling on Naqvi who was hired to turn around the channel," the source said.
India TV's TRP rating was 14.5 six months earlier and had slid to 11 at some point. It was at 13 last week. Sources in the editorial, however, added that if performance were the reason, Naqvi would not have been asked to serve a three-month notice period.
India TV in an official statement confirmed that its editorial director had resigned. Ritu Dhawan, India TV's MD & CEO confirmed, "We have accepted his resignation and asked Naqvi to serve his notice period." She said, "We are surprised at the reasons being attributed to it in the social media. Such reasons are baseless, and we condemn the effort being made to use it for political gains."
Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com
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