Zee Hindustan, a channel owned by Zee Media on Wednesday waged a war on its rival channels with a full page newspaper advertisement. The full page ad in The Hindustan Times said that time was up for Republic TV’s Arnab Goswami, Rajat Sharma of India TV and Aaj Tak anchor Anjana Om Kashyap.
The content of the ad read, “Who will watch Arnab’s debate now? Anjana was required only kal tak (till yesterday). Rajat’s courtroom in India has now been shut down.” The Kal Tak jibe was in reference to Kashyap’s channel Aaj Tak, while Rajat’s courtroom was aimed at the India TV owner’s famous courtroom drama TV show Aap Ki Adalat.
The ad by Zee Hindustan has come at a time when the Hindi TV news genre is set to witness considerable competition as Goswami’s Republic TV will soon launch its Hindi channel. Goswami has been going to town promoting his soon-to-be launched Republic Bharat. Analysts believe that the launch of Republic Bharat will make a serious dent in the viewership of existing Hindi news channels, where Aaj Tak has remained at the top for several years now. Goswami’s Republic TV has been the most watched channel in the English news genre since it was launched in 2017.
The newspaper ad by Zee Hindustan has created quite a buzz on social media too.
@Zee_Hindustan , you call this healthy competition????
What ad is this!!!
Anjana has been great for ages and Arnab doesn’t even belong to the Hindi genre….. and most importantly people decide whom they’d watch and whom they wouldn’t!!!! pic.twitter.com/sbXTQ8L0hL— ??The_Strongly_Vocal_Child?? (@HARSHITHA183) January 9, 2019
Zee Hindustan’s latest promotion ads basically blame anchors for distorting news. Is Subhash Chandra trying to say something to Sudhir Chaudhary? https://t.co/xQHxZkuKSW pic.twitter.com/1Sqm96XWb4
— Manisha Pande (@MnshaP) January 9, 2019
Goswami has already gone on a hiring spree by poaching talents from Zee and India News. Among the notable hiring for Republic Bharat are Shweta Tripathi of Zee Hindustan and Kavita Singh of India News, the Hindi news channel of NewsX family.
