Re: [IAC#RG] COMPLAINT of ethical violations in reporting by NDTV

To:

Ms. Sonia Singh

Editorial Director/NDTV and Head NDTV Ethics Committee

copy:

1) Shri Ashim Khurana, Chairman Staff Selection Commission

2) All subscribers of INDIA AGAINST CORRUPTION jan andolan primary mailing list

BY EMAIL

Dear Ms. Sonia Singh

There is a deafening silence from your organisatioon concerning the specific complaints we have made to NDTV at all levels concerning deliberate misreporting by your reporters / anchors on the alleged SSC exam leakages. Since NCTV seems unwilling to respond or take action promptly, I am now caused to send a copy of my complaint to Chairman SSC who equally appears to be a victim of your channel's political vendetta and whose organisation has responded promptly and in time to my RTI requests for information on these alleged leakages.

NB: If there is something about the word "immediately" contained in the "Corrigendum" clause of your organisation's Code of Ethics and Broadcasting Standards which you do not understand, I would be happy to correct the deficiency(s) in your education

Immediately : at once; instantly.

Immediately : without any intervening time or space.

Accordingly, I am again calling upon you to do the following things immediately,.

1) Issue appropriate corrigenda for the significant mistakes all your news stories (television and convergence) on alleged SSC CGL exam paper leaks

2) Suspend the reporter Sonal Mehrotra Kapoor for her broadcasts

sincerely

Sarbajit Roy

subscriber NDTV cable television channels

On Sun, Apr 1, 2018 at 9:37 PM, Sarbajit Roy <sroy.mb@gmail.com> wrote:

To:

Ms. Sonia Singh

Editorial Director/NDTV and Head NDTV Ethics Committee

BY EMAIL

Dear Ms. Singh

I am constrained to complain about the unethical practices being followed by your channels / news reporters, eg. Sonal Mehrotra Kapoor in broadcasting biased and one-sided reportage of the Staff Selection Commission's alleged examination "leaks". Several emails I have sent to your legal dept, the feedback section etc. about the recent Youthquake and Yuva Kranti series on this topic have been ignored and no corrigenda are forthcoming.

I am complaining that your aforesaid reporter has crossed the journalistic "line" by basing her reportage mainly on sources directly linked to three political parties, ie. CPI(ML), Indian National Congress and Swaraj India which have been manufacturing, circulating forged and fabricated documents allegedly depicting remote access softwares (like AMMY, Team Viewer etc) being used to remotely answer SSC's CGL 2017 examination while the computer based (online) exam is in progress.

I am complaining that your reporter has chosen, for reasons best known to her or your channels, to ignore the RTI replies of the Staff Selection Commission to me which say that the SSC has not conducted / held any computer based (online) exam in 2016, 2017 or 2018, and that they have no information of any complaint received for cheating, leakage or other malpractices in any (alleged) online examination of SSC.

NB: It is noteworthy that the SSC is an attached office of the DoPT (which also administers the RTI Act 2005) and my RTI queries and the replies received are easily acccesible to the whole world on DoPT's Rtionline webportal and certainly to your reporter if she did her job properly / honestly.

In this connection, it is not clear to me, or other subscriber viewers of NDTV like me, what authentic sources your aforesaid reporter Sonal MK is basing her stories on. However, because your news channel has subscribed to a self regulatory association which has prescribed a Code of Ethics for its members, you are obliged to ensure fairness and balance in reportage and present all points of view on a controversy no matter how much you personally disagree with that view or the person who holds that view. You are also required to issue corrigendums to any false reporting.

I am complaining that your reporter had deliberately excited dissatisfaction against the Central Government based on forged documents and with the motive to bring SSC aspirants to New Delhi on 31 March 2018 for CPI(ML) and Swaraj India's "Hallabol" premeditated violent agitation to assault police officers in Delhi and disrupt the city. It is noteworthy that lakhs of SSC aspirants from all over India taking coaching in Delhi were very well aware of the violent natrure of this agitation and stayed away from these protests. Your aforesaid reporter was also sitting in with these advocates of violence outside Mandir Marg Police Station on 31 March 2018 whiile they were coordinating attacks on police officers and other public servants utilising foreign social media resources..

Finally, I am suggesting that you have a personal / family conflict of interest qua the Indian National Congress Party, whose spokesperson had held a press conference on these alleged SSC paper leaks on or about 19 March 2018 where these alleged documents described by your reporter were circulated, and so should recuse from hearing my complaint.

sincerely

Sarbajit Roy

National Convenor

INDIA AGAINST CORRUPTION jan andolan

B-59 Defence Colony

New Delhi 110024

Tel : 8010205897