Governing Board members and senior member broadcasters of News Broadcasters Federation (NBF), India’s largest body of news broadcasters, held a productive meeting with Union Information & Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur on Tuesday.
The Governing Board of the NBF apprised the Union Minister of key issues faced by the news industry, the recent growth and trends in the news broadcasting sector, and the challenges facing the news broadcasting industry in recent times.
During the meeting, members of the NBF highlighted the need for the immediate resumption of viewership ratings for the news genre, which have been unilaterally paused and have severely impacted the sustainability of news channels.
Anurag Thakur said, “It was a pleasure to meet and exchange views with the NBF governing board led by Mr Arnab Goswami. It was a productive exchange of views and I look forward to engaging with the NBF on issues regarding news broadcasting and the role of news broadcasting in strengthening our democracy.”
Kartikeya Sharma, Promoter of ITV Network and Vice-President of the NBF, said, “It was a very positive meeting with the Minister. The Minister heard out all the matters raised by various members of the NBF. I would like to thank the Minister for hearing the viewpoints of all news channels from across India and from regional channels as well.”
Arnab Goswami, founding president of the NBF, spoke on the occasion and said, “The meeting of NBF members with the Minister was a wonderful opportunity to apprise him about the steps we have taken to build India’s largest federation of news broadcasters.”
Barun Das, Group CEO of News9 Network and Vice President of the NBF, said, “It was a pleasure to be a part of the NBF delegation to meet the honourable minister of I&B. The highly competitive news TV genre certainly needs a level-playing field for new promising players both in the national arena and regional markets.”
In its meeting with the Minister, the NBF also submitted that it is essential for news viewership ratings to be released.
Shankar Bala, CEO of Fourth Dimension and Vice President of the NBF, after the meeting with the Minister said, “Whatever the issues were, those were addressed. We have particularly stated that it is essential to release the viewership ratings for news channels, which were unilaterally stopped. The resumption of the publication of news ratings will ensure fair play and measurement-driven competitive news industry. We have a lot of expectations after our talks.”
After the meeting, Riniki Bhuyan Sarma, Managing Director of Pride East Entertainments, said, “As a team, NBF put forth the problems we tend to face and the ways in which we want to raise and address our concerns. At least, we can go forward and help regional industries survive, like ours. The Minister gave us a patient hearing and we are very grateful to the Ministry.”
The NBF delegation included Kartikeya Sharma, Founder/ Promoter of ITV Network, Arnab Goswami, Editor-in-Chief of the Republic Media Network, Barun Das, CEO of the TV9 News Network, Sanjive Narain, Founder/Managing Director of Prag News, Riniki Bhuyan Sarma, Chairperson/ Managing Director of Pride East Entertainment, Shankar Bala, CEO, Fourth Dimension, Hemant Sharma, News Director of TV9 Bharatvarsh, Manoj Gairola, Editor-in-Chief of News Nation, Mahendra Bhatla, Chairperson of MHOne, Divaakar S., Business Head of Newsfirst Kannada, R. Jai Krishna, Secretary-General of NBF and Eshita, Associate for Policy and Regulations of NBF.