News Broadcasting
BBC bows to border tension, puts off ‘Commando’ premiere
BBC has indefinitely postponed the telecast of its innovative reality show Commando, which was to debut on the channel in the first week of January.
The channel apparently feels the show is not in sync with the current tense atmosphere in the country, with war clouds looming low over the Indo-Pak border. Media reports quoting BBC World commissioning editor (Regions) Narendhra Morar say that the change in programming is in light of the current situation. “BBC World feels it inappropriate to telecast Commando at this point of time,” he has been quoted as saying. The show was to have given viewers a unique access to the Indian army, although some details of the training have been deleted due to security reasons.
Commando was conceived as a fly on the wall 13-part docudrama, covering the six-week commando-training course at the Commando Training School in Belgaum, Karnataka, considered one of the toughest in the world. Commando was pitched to be much more real than programmes like Survivor and Temptation Island, which are more like game shows where a bunch of people are placed in a certain peculiar situation.
Morar had earlier described Commando as an “observatory series” where one can see junior officers trying their best to clear the grueling course so as to gain the coveted title of commando. The commando-training programme, spanning from 11 September to 20 October 2001, had been captured by the camera without any interference into the training.
The documentary follows the experiences of two pairs of officers – Captain Sanjay Singh Routela with his ‘buddy’ Rajith Unni and Lieutenant Dilip Jha with his buddy Lt Vivek Maudgil, who were among the 60 Army officers who took the course. Of the two protagonists, 24-year-old Capt Routela hails from a family of Army officers; he is a fourth-generation Army officer and has the distinction of having fought in the Kargil conflict in 1999. Twenty-three-year-old Lt Jha on the other hand is posted at a forward base on the Indo-Pak border.
News Broadcasting
News18 India to air Sabse Bada Dangal on 4 May counting day
Channel promises fastest results, live trends and analysis across five states.
MUMBAI: Ballots will do the talking and screens will do the shouting. As counting day approaches for high-stakes Assembly elections across West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam and Puducherry, News18 India is gearing up for an all-day broadcast of its flagship election show, Sabse Bada Dangal, on 4 May from 6 am onwards. The Hindi news channel plans to deliver continuous, real-time updates as votes are tallied, combining live counting data with on-ground reporting and studio analysis. With political fortunes set to shift through the day, the coverage will track every swing, surge and surprise as trends turn into results.
The broadcast will feature a mix of senior political leaders, analysts and experts, offering instant reactions and decoding the evolving electoral picture. Expect heated debates, quick takes and detailed breakdowns as the numbers settle across all five states.
For News18 India, counting day has long been a high-visibility moment. The network is banking on its reporting reach, editorial bandwidth and technology-driven coverage to stay ahead in what is often a fiercely competitive news cycle.
With multiple battlegrounds and shifting narratives, the day promises both drama and data in equal measure. And if all goes to plan, Sabse Bada Dangal will once again turn the counting of votes into prime-time spectacle.
