Video news agency game opens up with PTI taking on ANI
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, January 27: From Monday, screen hungry byte givers will have another choice, as Press Trust of India (PTI) soft launches its news video arm to take on ANI, which is widely seen to be lacking in credibility.
The PTI has informed that it would be launching its video services from Monday. For the past few months, PTI had been training its existing editorial staff in mobile journalism along with video reporting. Besides, 100-150 new additions have been made in the editorial strength of the video arm of the PTI.
“Unlike ANI, we will not be dumb byte collectors who will just thrust mic to anyone and transmit even the garbage to the world. We will be working on complete news packages. Our focus will be on authenticity of news and the PTI standard of journalism will be seen in the news packages,” a senior ranking editor of the PTI told The Raisina Hills.
The PTI is India’s sole news agency, which is professionally run, while being managed by a trust. The UNI, an old rival of the PTI, is surviving for the namesake, following pathological union politics, which almost killed the news agency. Two new outfits, ANI and IANS, are privately run, and are widely known to lack credibility. They are often accused for peddling agenda-driven contents to serve vested interests.
“Besides video reporting with traditional camera-mic set up, we have also been given training for mobile journalism (MoJo). We got two-week training for video journalism,” said another editor of the PTI.
Unlike PTI, which adheres by all the norms of the labour laws, its private rivals regularly get legal notices from their employees for flouting the laws, including not providing even proper employment letters. Also, while PTI has senior journalists working in its editorial ranks, ANI and IANS have to depend on novices, including some who have not even gone to media schools, because of their inability to afford trained scribes with experiences.
“We don’t have access as given to ANI by the current government, but the launch of the video news services should bring new opportunities for us, including the revenue stream,” added the editor with PTI. The Narendra Modi-led NDA government is seen to be promoting ANI by giving it access to offices and ministers along with planting of the official reactions to breaking news.
The video news agency market is growing in India amid mushrooming of television channels, who bank on the bytes and footages to run their 24X7 show and also feed their discussion programmes. With most of the news channels lacking editorial strength across the country, the video news agency fills the void by providing them with footages and bytes to given them the semblance to claim that they have pan-India presence.
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