News Broadcasting
Financial experts decode Budget 2020 at CNBC-TV18’s Townhall
MUMBAI: English business news channel — CNBC-TV18 of Network18 group held The Budget Townhall 2020 to analyse and have an open dialogue on the announcements made by the union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
The fourth edition of the townhall witnessed economic and financial stakeholders come together in New Delhi to offer their expert perspective and decode the biggest economic policy event in the country.
The townhall panel moderated CNBC-TV18’s managing editor Shereen Bhan, comprised of policy architects and financial stakeholders such as NITI Aayog chief executive officer Amitabh Kant, revenue secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey, CBIC member tax policy Dr John Joseph, CBDT chairman Pramod Chandra Mody, expenditure secretary TV Somanathan, chief economic advisor Dr. Krishnamurthy Subramanian, DPIIT chairman Guruprasad Mohapatra, DIPAM secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey, finance secretary Rajeev Kumar among others. The closing address at the townhall was given by IDFC FIRST Bank managing director and chief executive officer V Vaidyanathan.
The luminaries, together on a common platform, shared their in-depth analysis while evaluating the big-ticket announcements made across sectors.
News Broadcasting
Senior media executive Madhu Soman exits Zee Media
Former Reuters and Bloomberg leader says he leaves with “no regrets” after brief stint at WION and Zee Business
NOIDA: Madhu Soman, a veteran of global newsrooms and media sales floors, has stepped away from Zee Media Corporation after a short stint steering business strategy for WION and Zee Business.
In a reflective LinkedIn note marking his departure, Soman said his time within the network’s corridors was always likely to be brief. “Some chapters close faster than expected,” he wrote, signalling the end of a nearly two-year spell in which he oversaw both editorial partnerships and commercial strategy.
Soman joined Zee Media in 2022 after more than a decade abroad with Reuters and Bloomberg, returning to India to take on the role of chief business officer for WION and Zee Business. His mandate was ambitious: bridge the newsroom and the revenue desk while expanding digital and broadcast reach.
During the stint, Zee Business reached break-even for the first time since its launch in 2005, while WION refreshed programming and strengthened its digital footprint across platforms such as YouTube and Facebook.
But Soman suggested the cultural fit proved uneasy. Describing himself as a “cultural misfit”, he hinted at deeper tensions between editorial instincts shaped in global newsrooms and the realities of India’s television news ecosystem.
Before joining Zee, Soman spent more than seven years at Bloomberg in Hong Kong as head of broadcast sales for Asia-Pacific, expanding the company’s news syndication business across several markets. Earlier, he held senior editorial roles at Reuters, overseeing online strategy in India and managing Reuters Video Services from London.
His career began in television and wire reporting, including a stint with ANI during the 1999 Kargil conflict, before moving into digital publishing as India’s internet media landscape took shape.
Now, after nearly three decades in broadcast and digital media, Soman is leaving Delhi NCR and returning to his hometown, Trivandrum.
Exhausted, he admits. But unbowed. And with one quiet line that sums up the journey: he didn’t sell his soul — because some things, after all, are not for sale.
