New Delhi: The newly-formed Opposition bloc INDIA will boycott 14 news anchors from half-a-dozen English and Hindi channels in the country, among whom are Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, Bharat24’s Rubika Liyaquat, India Today-Aaj Tak’s Sudhir Chaudhury and TimesNow group editor Navika Kumar.
The grouping’s coordination committee decided Wednesday not to send representatives to their shows, in keeping with their long-standing grouse that a section of the media only mouth the ruling BJP’s narrative. In the past, certain Opposition leaders have even called them “Modia”.
The other ten singled out by INDIA’s media sub-committee are Chitra Tripathi, Gaurav Sawant and Shiv Aroor from the India Today-Aaj Tak network; Aman Chopra, Amish Devgn, Anand Narsimhan from CNN-News18; Sushant Sinha from TimesNow; Prachi Parashar from India TV; Aditi Tyagi from Bharat Express and Ashok Shrivastava from DD News.
One of the agendas of the INDIA alliance is to sway public opinion, which they believe has been captured by the BJP via these media houses. To do this, many Opposition parties have depended on social media and independent journalists to amplify their message. During the Congress’s mega outreach programme “Bharat Jodo Yatra” – led by Rahul Gandhi – the MP only gave interviews to YouTubers.
The Opposition’s media sub-committee has also decided to form a joint social media strategy to bolster their image and message.
“We will stay away from these TV shows because we don’t wish to legitimise the hate-filled narrative spewed by these anchors”, Pawan Khera, part of the media sub-committee, said to ThePrint.
The BJP jumped on the alliance as soon as the list was released. Party national president J.P. Nadda said the group was interested in only two things – “bashing Sanatana Sanskriti” and “bullying the media”.
Nadda said the bloc’s list of targets was made in true “Nazi style”, as he slammed their “Emergency-era mindset”.
He trained his guns specifically on the Congress, saying the party had a history of bullying the media and silencing differing views. “Pandit Nehru curtailed free speech and arrested those who criticised him. Indira Ji remains the Gold Medal winner of how to do it — called for committed judiciary, committed bureaucracy and imposed the horrific Emergency. Rajiv Ji tried to bring media under state control but failed miserably. Sonia Ji-led UPA was banning social media handles simply because the Congress did not like their views (sic),” he said.
He asked the bloc to immediately “stop their antics” and focus on constructive work and the people. “Else, the path to obscurity will get even clearer,” he added.
At Wednesday’s first meeting of the coordination committee in Delhi, the INDIA bloc also started talks on seat sharing and froze common agendas like the caste census. They will hold joint public rallies in the future, the first being in Bhopal in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh early next month.
Edited by Tikli Basu
Also read: INDIA parties to blacklist some TV news anchors, not send representatives to their shows