The NewsX Death Watch

Over the last week or so, I’ve been getting increasingly desparate phonecalls from all sorts of people. Some from people who still work at the beleagured channel. Others from people who once worked there. And then again, some from interested bystanders.

It seems we’re all playing the same macabre parlour game: the NewsX Death Watch. The assumption is simple — the channel has run out of money, and if they don’t manage to find a buyer, they’re going to have to shut down. Since almost everything needed to run the channel is on lease (the cameras, edit suites, broadcast equipment …), if payments aren’t made on time then at some point the lease company is going to cut its losses and either try to lease the equipment newsx is using to another company, or sell it off to whoever’s willing to buy.

I can’t think of a single instance when there has been so much speculation about the survival of a news outfit.

In the past, when news operations have been shut down — they have happened in the dead of night, with people being informed at home, and the office shuttered in the morning. Think Sakaal’s Delhi operations, or the time when TV18 had to let go of a lot of people, or when the Hindustan Times fired staff from its old printing facility.

What sets apart the ongoing newsx soap opera is that the people who will definitely lose their jobs whether there is a deal or not, is the current management. So, for all practical purposes, the rank and file is safe in the case of a buyout.

Which brings us right back to the question — has the buyout gone through? The channel’s editor seemed to believe it had when he spoke to members of the editorial staff. I don’t who had said what to him, but he expected an announcement last week, that still hasn’t happened.

Even more interestingly, it seems no such message was sent out to the technical staff. My sources in Bombay are suggesting the relationship between the board, promoters and heads of the technical staff has become increasingly strained and conversations about key decisions have dried up.

So, how much longer before we know? I don’t know the answer to that one, so I’m asking you —

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As always, here’s hoping everything works out so everybody inside NewsX has a Happy New Year.

Recovered from the site’s WordPress archive, where it was published on 2008-12-28.