The recent exit of senior journalists Punya Prasun Bajpai and Milind Khandekar from ABP News has become a subject of controversy. There has been intense amount of speculation that the trio was compelled to resign over their reportage which was deemed to be critical of the Central Government. Now, social media is rife with the claim that Punya Prasun Bajpai is all set to join NDTV from August 15.
तैयार हो जाओ भक्तो 15 अगस्त से दोनों आ रहे है
8:00 – 9:00 पुण्य प्रसून बाजपाई
9:00 – 10:00 रविश कुमारPosted by I Am With Ravish Kumar NDTV on Saturday, August 4, 2018
The above post is by the Facebook page I support Ravish Kumar NDTV which has over 450,000 followers. It was posted on August 4 and has been shared more than 7600 times since. Another page, Team Ravish Kumar too posted this information on August 4 which has been shared over 2700 times. According to these posts, Bajpai will be on air from 8-9 pm followed by Ravish Kumar who will host the 9 pm show on NDTV. Other pages which have shared it include I am with Barkha Dutt, Andh Bhakt Mukt Bharat, Delhi Government Viral News and a page called Masterstroke, named after the prime time show on ABP News which was hosted by Bajpai.
This information has been widely circulated on Twitter as well. Cumulatively, this piece of information has been shared thousands of times across various platforms by now.
#NDTV को हम बधाई देते हैं जिस तरह उन्होने रविश कुमार जी का साथ नही छोड़ा ठीक उसी प्रकार वाजपेयी जी को भी सपोर्ट करेंगे 👍 pic.twitter.com/DMi3aIOStD
— Sapna Choudhary (@sapna_indian) August 4, 2018
NDTV issues clarification
NDTV has clarified that the said information is false. Speaking to Alt News, Suparna Singh, CEO of NDTV said, “NDTV has always fought for and stood with independent, unbiased journalism. We covered the ABP controversy extensively on our channels. Our league of top anchors remains unchanged without any new additions.“
Misinformation spreads rapidly on social media, allowing little time for reflection or prudence. This is especially observed in cases where misinformation is likely to conform to an individual or group’s political, ideological or religious bias. In this case, pages and accounts critical of the Central Government and the BJP put out this misleading information and many social media users opposed to the ruling party shared it merrily.
Independent journalism that speaks truth to power and is free of corporate and political control is possible only when people start contributing towards the same. Please consider donating towards this endeavour to fight fake news and misinformation.
