www.outlookindia.com | Recasting Ouch

www.outlookindia.com | Recasting Ouch

DOORDARSHAN: REVAMP

Recasting Ouch

A new team leads the DD revamp, leaving the old guard fuming

ANURADHA RAMAN

What do you do if you are a public service broadcaster and elections are just around the corner? You rejig your news channel and hope that your constituency—that inscrutable mass that is the voters—will notice the good work of the government. Back in 2004, the BJP-led NDA had done it. Cut to 2013, the Congress-led UPA is doing the same, though the scale of the revamp is much more modest. The BJP put up a whole new team in place, with spiffy anchors hired from rival news channels and having on its rolls those close to the political dispensation. But it lost the election in 2004 and the news team disappeared into the studios of other news and current affairs channels.
Yet again, DD is waking up to the competition, and elections. For the time being, the current rejig is being confined to the prime band between eight and 10.30 pm. The advertisements have already begun in right earnest, exhorting viewers all of last week to tune into News Night—a current affairs programme in Hindi and English which made a low-key debut on January 28. Sources say close to Rs 4 crore have alr­eady been spent on the advertising.


Even with its CEOs, DD has always attracted the criticism that they are drawn from among those perceived to be close to the ruling dispensation. It is the same with incumbent CEO Jawhar Sircar, who came in a little over a year ago and who sources say is keen on the Doordarshan revamping project. In fact, so enthusiastic is the gentleman that he apparently shoots off mails to colleagues, directing them to apportion some airtime to him—as he moves from one public engagement to another!

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