AIADMK gets its own TV channel

Owning a newspaper and a television news channel has become an unwritten rule for a political party in Tamil Nadu. Now, the ruling AIADMK, which had no television channel to propagate its views, will soon have its own TV channel. It maybe recalled that Jaya TV is now controlled by the V K Sasikala family.

'NewsJ'-- the new television channel owned by relatives of some of the senior ministers of the AIADMK government, will go on air in the next couple of months.

The channel's website, news app and YouTube channel, were launched recently by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam.

For nearly two decades, Jaya TV was the official propaganda arm of the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu.

Everything changed when the AIADMK split into two factions --one led by Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and the other by V K Sasikala -- in August, 2017.

Since Jaya TV was a private entity managed by the Sasikala family, the secret efforts by the Tamil Nadu government for a take over, failed.

The new news channel, comes seven months after the AIADMK launched its own mouthpiece - Namadhu Puratchi Thalaivi Amma. This followed the take over of erstwhile Namadhu MGR by the Sasikala family.

Namadhu MGR, which was launched by J Jayalalithaa to air her views following the death of her mentor M G Ramachandran, in the late 1980s, went on to become the official propaganda arm of the AIADMK till her death in 2016. Jaya TV, launched in 1999, was also an integral part of Jayalalithaa’s publicity arm.

However, control of both news organisations were wrested by the V K Sasikala family, after the AIADMK split into two factions – one led by EPS-OPS and the other led by T T V Dhinakaran. AIADMK had no mouthpiece since then.

Jaya TV was almost an extension of the AIADMK and carried news only related to Jayalalithaa and the party since its inception in 1999.

When Jayalalithaa was Chief Minister, she occasionally went live on Jaya TV to make announcements relating to her government, thereby giving it a semi-official status.

AIADMK is the most recent to have a television channel of its own. The DMK has Kalaignar TV, Mega and Vasanth TVs are owned by senior Congress leaders, Captain TV is owned by DMDK founder Vijayakant, Makkal TV (PMK) and Velicham TV (VCK).

Kalaignar and Jaya televisions enjoyed semi-official status when the late M Karunanidhi and J Jayalalithaa ruled Tamil Nadu.