Republic TV founder Arnab Goswami recently lost his cool after a Pakistani guest referred to NDTV journalism on Jammu and Kashmir to drive home a point that everything was not normal in the valley. This irked Goswami so much that he refused to possess any knowledge about his own former employer.
“What’s this NDTV. I’ve not heard of an Indian TV channel called NDTV. I don’t know anything,” Goswami announced. The Pakistani guest appearing on his TV channel heard quoting a reporter from NDTV reporting on the prevailing situation in Srinagar. But Goswami interrupted and said, “You keep repeating NDTV’s name. Do you Pakistanis only like NDTV and Rahul Gandhi? You repeat NDTV’s names 50 times in a day. You have lost your mental balance that you keep repeating the names of NDTV and Rahul Gandhi.”
He then asked his Pakistani guest to speak to NDTV directly as he said, “Don’t mention NDTV’s name on my channel. NDTV, NDTV, NDTV, Rahul Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi. You guys have lost your mental balance,” Goswami concluded before turning his attention to his in-house self-proclaimed patriot Gaurav Arya, who Janta Ka Reporter had caught peddling fake news earlier this year.
Goswami had shot to fame from his stint as an anchor in NDTV before his career progression took to Times Now. Not many knew that he held grudges against his former employer until he launched his own TV channel, Republic TV and Republic Bharat.
This is not the first time Goswami was left irritated by the mention of NDTV. In June this year, Goswami had launched a tirade against NDTV after a guest questioned his credentials as a journalist. The guest in question had asked him mockingly, “I don’t know from where you did your journalism…You don’t know anything. You don’t know IPC.”
Left red-faced on his own channel, Goswami had launched a stinging attack against NDTV as he made a veiled dig by reminding his guests about the SEBI action against his former bosses Prannoy Roy and his wife Radhika Roy.
Goswami said, “I am not the biggest legal expert, I never claimed to be. I am not even a trained lawyer. I have an above-average understanding of law…Do you believe in the law when the CBI pulls up Indira Jaising’s NGO, Lawyers Collective, for FCRA violations?…. Let me ask my second question. My second question will be even more stinging…Independent bodies, market regulators are pulling up a certain Lutyen media organization for financial improprieties.”
He asked one of his regular right-wing guests if he should be direct in his attack against the NDTV, where he worked as a reporter and anchor for a considerably long time. Both Goswami and his right-wing guest started laughing.
Both Prannoy and his wife Radhika were banned by SEBI from holding any management positions in NDTV for two years. However, the duo got relief from the appellate authority, which has stayed the SEBI order for now.
