Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu has started trimming Rajya Sabha TV and the first axe has fallen on the Chief Executive Officer’s post.
Rajya Sabha TV, which is controlled by the Rajya Sabha Secretariat, with the country’s Vice-President as the top boss, was launched in 2011. In a decision taken on Thursday, Prasar Bharati chairperson Surya Prakash will head a search committee to look for an editor-in-chief for the channel.
Till recently Gurpreet Singh Sappal doubled as the CEO and editor-in-chief of the channel. He resigned after Hamid Ansari’s term as Vice-President ended this August.
The CEO’s position may not be the only one to be axed. At present RS TV has 67 full-timers and 487 persons working on contract. “The Vice-President has directed a time-bound review and rationalisation of manpower,” a senior Rajya Sabha Secretariat officer said.
The RS TV will also shift its focus from news and limit itself largely to covering Parliamentary proceedings. In a review of the channel, chaired by Mr. Naidu on Wednesday, he posed questions to officials as to why RS TV should broadcast news. Interestingly, Mr Naidu quoted media veterans to make the point. “He said that several media veterans told him that in context of a multitude of several 24X7 news channels, RS TV needs to seriously examine the need to continue with news windows on it in the name of which substantial expenditure is being incurred,” the official added.
RS TV has had an interesting journey since its inception. It received brickbats from the government of the day. When UPA was under attack for the 2G scam, the channel hosted a series of panel discussions on the topic. More recently, in 2015, during the first Yoga Day, it was criticised for underplaying the event.
