Sunday, December 12, 2010

Blast from Past: Star News' BJP phobia

A news published in Rediff gives a interesting insight to Media games even in early days

Rediff Reports

The Rupert Murdoch-owned Star News is determined to push its anti-BJP agenda at any cost.

The Vajpayee government, though fully aware of the negative slant of the channel, is unable to counter it effectively since Information and Broadcasting Minister Pramod Mahajan is not above doing business withR athikant Basu, the channel's boss in India.

Last Saturday, Star in its prime time bulletin implied that the BJP might be involved in the murder of Indian Express correspondent Shivani. The bulletin said 'Shivani, a member of the investigative cell of the Indian Express,, had done a lot of stories against the CBI and the BJP.'

The truth is that in her all-too-brief career she hardly did a story against the BJP. So livid was Mahajan at seeing Star News that he immediately called Basu. Caught on the wrong foot, Basu in turn ordered the Prannoy Roy-owned news- making company to delete the offensive sentence. In all subsequent bulletins that night the BJP was not dragged into what was a case of murder.

So if one were to believe Rediff, the antiBJP tilt is in the DNA of NDTV

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1 comment:

  1. Amazing piece of information! Why were Prannoy Roy and company bailed out by the BJP during 6 years of the reign in Delhi? Well, money would have done the job for NDTV.

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