Cong seeks report on Jagan's channel, programme aired again
Congress today took serious note of rebel party MP Y S Jaganmohan Reddy-owned TV channel and newspaper attacks on Sonia Gandhi but the channel today repeated the programme without some critical captions and voice-overs.
"The party has sought a report from the state unit on the issue (telecast of a programme on Sakshi television channel)," AICC Media Department Chairman Janardhan Dwivedi said.
Congress spokesman Shakeel Ahmed said a view on the issue would be taken once the report is received from the state unit.
Sakshi, the 24-hour Telugu news channel owned by the 38-year-old Kadapa MP and son of late chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy, had launched a frontal attack on Sonia as well as the organisation in a one-hour programme yesterday.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was also targeted along with the "coterie around Sonia" for the "sorry state of affairs in Congress."
Though Sakshi TV announced that the 8 AM show scheduled today would be a "re-telecast" of the episode aired on Friday night (and repeated on Saturday morning), viewers did not get to see some of the captions and commentary which were part of the earlier telecast.
The master title of the programme "Hastagatam" became "Congress@125" in today's telecast.
At the same time, Sakshi CEO Priyadarshini Ram said the story was not against either Sonia or Singh and maintained that there was no intervention by Jaganmohan with regard to the content of the TV channel.
"It was not a story against...either Sonia Gandhi or Manmohan Singh. It was a current story that was based on the 125 years of the Congress party, how it was faring...
"Jaganmohan Reddy, on the day of the inauguration of this media house, made one specific statement saying that this channel would be unbiased, truthful and clear-headed. There is no effort from Jaganmohan Reddy or intervention by him on the content of Sakshi television," Ram said.
He also clarified that the channel has made "no change at all" in the content of the programme that was shown on Friday and Saturday and repeated today at least thrice.
"We completely stand by our story. There is no U-turn as the same story has been replayed with some additions and a new anchor. That is only a technical process," Ram said.
He explained that some of the 'sooshes' (technical parlance in TV production in which some of the captions shown instantaneously are not recorded) were not repeated today.
"Otherwise, there was neither reduction nor change in the programme content," he said
He said the story against Sonia Gandhi was only a compilation of various news stories that were reported in the media."We only said what is factual," the CEO said.
"Jagan had no knowledge about the story telecast on Friday.
In fact, we telecast another story on Sonia Gandhi two days ago after the elections to local bodies in Rae Bareli. Even Jagan had no say in it though I later discussed about it with him," Ram said.
A senior party leader said, "Though there is an understanding that it (the telecast of the programme) was done at the behest of Jagan, but the party would not like to act in haste as he has not said anything himself."
Jaganmohan had defied the party High Command and continued with his controversial Odarpu yatra. He had also been criticising the K Rosaiah-led government in Andhra Pradesh.
Congress workers in various parts of Andhra Pradesh protested against the telecast of the "blasphemous" news feature against Sonia Gandhi by the television channel.
Hitting out at Jaganmohan, senior party leader from the state K Keshavrao, a former PCC chief, said there was a "design" behind the airing of the programme.
"He (Jagan) has done it with a deep design. The high command has to deal with it," he said, but added, "We don't want to make a martyr of him because all that he wants is to provoke us so that we take action against him and he becomes a hero."
