Rajat Sharma re-elected as president of News Broadcasters Association

India TV Editor-in-Chief Rajat Sharma was re-elected as the president of News Broadcasters Association (NBA) on Thursday.

According to a statement, the members at NBA Board meeting urged Sharma to continue as president.

The Board also elected Anuradha Prasad Shukla, Chairperson-cum-Managing Director News24 Broadcast India Ltd, NBA vice-president and M K Anand, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer Times Network Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd, honorary treasurer for 2020-2021.

The other members of NBA Board are M V Shreyams Kumar (Mathrubhumi), Rahul Joshi (TV18 Broadcast Ltd), Avinash Pandey (ABP Network Pvt. Ltd), I Venkat (Eenadu Television Pvt. Ltd), Kalli Purie Bhandal (TV Today Network Ltd), Sonia Singh (NDTV) and Sudhir Chaudhary (Zee Media Corporation Ltd).

Addressing the meeting, Sharma said that this year witnessed an "unprecedented challenge of unregulated toxic content" by some channels who were not NBA members.

"NBA believes in editorial standards ensuring objectivity, neutrality, fairness and accuracy in reporting. We have appealed to the advertisers not to support toxic content and sensationalism that promotes hate. I am happy to share that reputed brands have come forward and supported our stand," he said.

Referring to the TRP scam, he said NBA has been highlighting its concerns about the veracity of TV viewership data, which have been prone to irrational fluctuations.

"The lid was blown with the recent revelations by Mumbai Police relating to tampering of meters installed in panel homes by BARC. This has led to BARC suspending the weekly individual ratings for all news channels for 12 weeks," he said.

He urged NBA members during this 12-week period to take all necessary steps to improve the content of their channels and "move away from the tyranny of ratings" and ensure that independent self-regulatory model adopted by news broadcasters is vigorously supported and its decisions adhered to by all of them.