Toxic TV news on Indian channels just seems to be increasing day by day instead of reducing.
Even with all the trolling, jokes, and memes made on several news reporters and their horrid way of giving news to the Indian public, it has not discouraged any channel from thinking twice about the news they give out.
After the tragic passing away of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput and the ongoing investigation into his death and its cause, Indian news channels have been on a roll, covering every single angle imaginable and even those beyond our imagination.
This has been severely criticized by many Indians who have called out multiple news channels for wasting air-time talking nonsense about this case and ignoring other very real and equally tragic events across the country.
The Madhya Pradesh (MP) floods, or even the super cyclone that ravaged Bengal earlier this year, and more are just a few examples of how national news channels have disappointed people.
It has often been wondered what could be a way to control them a little and make them behave in more ethical ways. Now it seems that there might be a solution to this.
Brands Pull Back Ads?
Some of India’s top advertisers are apparently planning on pulling back their advertisements (ads) from some news channels because of a rise in their toxic content.
As per a report from BestMediaInfo.com, if news channels do not get their act together, they would have to take a look at their TV news adex and take action if necessary.
Krishnarao Buddha, Senior Category Head, Marketing, Parle Products has stated that “As a viewer and advertiser, I really feel the news channels have stooped to a pathetic state and if the advertisers have the opportunity to break this vicious cycle, they must do it collectively and be a real purpose-driven brand. While doing this, we should state the reason that we are all doing it because of the content. I agree that such an environment is dangerous for any brand because it comes back to hounding it.”
RS Sodhi from Amul has also said that while they cannot stop advertising on news channels completely, they would not be above pressurising some of the ones that are creating negativity from behaving themselves.
Sodhi stated, “Amul currently spends 35-40% of its total television budget on news. Undoubtedly, news channels are an important medium to reach out to the consumer and hence you cannot stop advertising on them completely. But, having said that, you can always pressure the ones that do not behave. Without mentioning any particular incident, we can definitely tell them to behave and not to show unwanted aggression.”
Many of the brands also believe that the top advertisers should unite at the moment and communicate with these news channels that their method of giving news or the news itself they are giving might be making their platforms unsafe for the brand.
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Here are some recent examples itself of how bad the national news media has gotten in India:
1. Navika Kumar WhatsApp
2. Arnab Goswami ‘Mujhe Drugs De Do’
The bit about drugs starts at the time-stamp of 1:45 if you want to skip all the other nonsense.
A YouTube channel even made a whole remix of this bit.
3. Amish Devgan And Karan Johar
Amish Devgan of News18’s bit starts at 23:36 time-stamp.
Viewers should also hold some responsibility in all this, since watching any of it in the first place, no matter how entertaining it might be, is a form of encouragement.
Our views only drive up their TRPs and allow them to continue their bad and unethical journalism, causing it to go on rising.
Image Credits: Google Images
Sources: The Hindu, BestMediaInfo, Hindustan Times
Find the blogger: @chirali_08
This post is tagged under: Toxic TV News, toxic indian tv news, indian news, indian news channels, indian news channels toxic, indian news toxic, arnab goswami, amish devgan, navika kumar, navika kumar whatsapp, amish devgan karan johar, arnab goswami drugs, arnab goswami mujhe drugs de do
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