News Broadcasting
ABP Network to shift from FTA to pay
KOLKATA: The news network which recently decided to reposition its brand identity from ABP News Network to ABP Network is also bringing a change to its business model. ABP Network chief executive officer Avinash Pandey said that the network will soon go pay from its current free-to-air (FTA) model.
“We are quite determined we will soon become pay. We are building that kind of content to be acceptable to the people who pay for content. Our regional channels were already on pay model. We only went FTA because of uncertain environment caused by NTO 1.0. From carriage perspective, NTO 2.0 is favourable,” Pandey said in a virtual fireside chat with Indiantelevision.com founder, CEO and editor in chief Anil Wanvari.
Pandey also noted that he is not in favour of the free-to-air model because anything free in this country is taken for granted. “So, in today’s world when you have WhatsApp circulating all the videos you are likely to show in the evening and Twitter already debating views and counter views before you discuss anything on TV it’s already discussed online. In this scenario, how to build a pay channel is the challenge,” he said.
News Broadcasting
Uma Sudhir signs off from NDTV after 27 years
The executive editor shaped NDTV’s southern reportage for nearly three decades
NEW DELHI: Senior journalist Uma Sudhir has retired from NDTV, bringing to a close a 27-year association with the network.
Sudhir served as executive editor, heading NDTV’s south India editorial operations. Over nearly three decades, she emerged as one of the most recognisable faces of on-ground reporting from the region, with sustained coverage of politics, governance and social issues across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
At NDTV, Sudhir played a central role in strengthening regional journalism within national television news. Her reporting consistently connected local developments to the national conversation, ensuring stories from the field shaped policy debates beyond studio discussions. Known for her boots-on-the-ground approach, she came to represent a generation of reporters whose authority rested on fieldwork rather than prime-time punditry.
An award-winning journalist, Sudhir is a recipient of the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award and the Chameli Devi Jain Award. Her body of work has been widely recognised for its public-interest focus, spanning elections, governance, gender issues, rural distress, environmental reporting and social justice.
