As Vice-President of India and Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari’s term comes to a close in this August 2017. Now the Rajya Sabha will see a transition. The transition became clear once 5 guest anchors including Bharat Bhushan, Siddharth Varadarajan, Urmilesh Singh and Govindraj Ethiraj, were told not to host any show with effect from 1st June.
Vice-President’s term coming to an end in this August, and with little chances of BJP offering Hamid Ansari a 3rd term and the Rajya Sabha TV is already preparing for a transition. As the chairman of the Rajya Sabha, the Vice-President of India also becomes the head of Rajya Sabha TV, which was launched in 2011 during his first tenure. The journalists of the TV show held weekly shows on various topics including security policies, foreign policies, media and business news.
Over the past few years, this TV channel has been under scathing attack from different quarters. A report by In 2015 The Hindu mentioned that how this channel was criticized for the inadequate telecast of International Yoga Day celebrations by R Madhav.
The BJP party members had criticized the channel for its critical take on govt. policies. They also went on to clarify The Hindu that it was not obliged to be the mouthpiece of the government as it is not the government channel. In May this year, Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, Mr. Kurien reconstituted the content advisory to keep a check on the objectivity.
In June 2017, amid raging debates over the role of the press and its freedom in the country, Hamid Ansari said only a “free and responsible” media can hold power to account in this age of “post-truths” and “real facts”. Mr. Ansari also added that freedom of the press guaranteed by the Constitution was subject “only to reasonable restrictions in the interest of the integrity of the country, the security of the state, defamation, and incitement to an offense”.
The editor-in-chief and founder of RS TV Gurdeep Singh Sappal said the decision was taken as part of “forward planning”, keeping in mind the transition in August 2017. He also said, “The next chairman of RS TV will decide the objective of the channel.”
Mr. Sappal said though the entire guest anchors have been told to discontinue hosting, he has developed a beautiful in-house capacity to run the channel in an objective way. On his role, Mr. Sappal said, surely he had to develop a “certain work ethic”. According to him “No other public broadcaster has done what we’ve done”.
Journalist MK Venu called it a “winding-up process”. Mr. Ethiraj of Policy Watch show said he was aware of the developments for over 1-2 years. “There is a new team that will take over the responsibilities,” he said.
To keep a check on the efficiency and objectivity of the channel especially after the leadership change the Deputy Chairman of the RS TV, P J Kurien of Congress reconstituted the content advisory committee in last month.
