End of bland, plain, vanilla news

Navika Kumar, Group Editor Times Network, Editor in Chief Times of Now and Times Now Navbharat, has completed over three decades in journalism. Having started her career in print journalism,  Kumar switched to News TV in 2005 and since then there has been no looking back for her.

As part of our series Headline Makers, we spoke to Kumar about her three-decade-long journey, her shift from print to TV and her views on the current state of TV journalism. 

When you look back at the last two decades of your News TV career, what are the big changes that you see in the newsroom culture? 

For someone like me who came from print to TV, it was a whole new world when I joined in 2005. I found people a lot younger, exuberant, more talkative and a lot more breathless because the pace of work was really fast.

Having said that, much of it remains the same. What has changed is the younger lot that keeps coming and replacing the young ones who then become the mid-management and mid-editorial room. 

The younger lot comes in and they have more stars in their eyes. They think it's a rosy world out there. We don't often see that more than inspiration there is perspiration that goes behind the newsroom, which is still a livewire, and that feel of the newsroom has not changed.

It's livewire, it's pulsating and it's happening all the time. There is excitement in the air and sometimes you can cut through that excitement with a knife because it's so real. To that extent, the excitement and passion continue. What I also see changing is that the younger lot has more ideas, sometimes they are in a hurry to get to a place where we took longer to get. Also, I find the energy getting better and better.

Views have replaced news on TV and opinion has taken centre stage, what has led to this shift?

Technology has changed our life. A lot of news that people used to get from TV channels, which was the more real-time news that they were looking at, a lot of it gets covered in digital platforms and the phone in your hand will keep sending you headlines every now and then. So people have the news, the headlines on their phones. While we also continue to do that, yes at the same time, opinion has become more than news on TV channels.

We have to remember that when instant news has been found on the mobile phone, there has to be a value-added when they switch on their television. News TV is now moving in that phase where opinion comes in, where not just the headline, but additional information comes in. So it's not that the news is not there, it's no longer just the headline that you break and go on; we give you a dimension that is not possible to get on a digital platform in a headline.

So, the information-add and the value-add in the news have become an important aspect of the coverage of news. Yes, opinion has taken centre stage. 

Things have happened but people need to understand why it has happened. Now there is a lot of attention paid to value add, opinions, the different voices and providing that platform to get those voices for people to understand the perspectives. Because the plain vanilla news, even if they have, it's important to understand the depth and the perspectives and that's what television gives them.

What about the ‘Neutrality of News Anchor’ that we so much talk about in journalism schools, we don't see that in practice?

If you meet any youngster today, they will have a view. Opinion as a whole is something that is changing the generation. To expect bland, plain vanilla news from a neutral point of view is possibly something that has seen its best days. 

TV news is for audiences and audiences have their views and opinions. For them, the news is what they got on the digital platforms, now what they need is perspectives. So what we try to do is not merely neutral but balanced. We give you perspective X and perspective Y and after which you are an informed individual /audience and you can make your own conclusions because it's no longer the ‘Idiot Box’.We know our audiences are extremely intelligent, and when they are intelligent, they know how to form their own conclusions. 

In the day and age of social media, you can have all kinds of things that are floating around. When you come to a brand like Times Now, and you come to Times Network, you know this is a media institution, not just an organisation, we have a 182-year-old history. We have the credibility to stand up; the minuscule portions of time that we might make an error, we have the guts to acknowledge it and correct it and inform our viewers.

Journalists with credibility are important in any news organisation or institution. What happens is: news can be floating around, but how do you differentiate between news and a rumour? It can only be differentiated when your journalist can at the speed of light call up, cross-check with credible first-hand sources and decide that what they are putting out is fact or fiction and that is what we bring to the table.

Why do prime-time anchors shout on TV, what is this fascination for high-volume journalism about, does it really help?

Most people associate certain words with certain brands or organisations. So noise is associated with some brands and which those brands are, I don't need to tell the audiences.

If there is one word that goes with the Times brand, its credibility. To me, a lot is made of the noise that was a form that existed. It was a formula. Noise TV was there and I think it has outlived its utility and nobody is relating to noise anymore. Now people want to hear views and opinions on issues, and in that space people want to hear complete sentences. People want to hear voices and relate. As I said, perspective is why people want to come to news channels. 

For us, somebody speaking over somebody else is a total no-no. TV watching has to be enjoyable, it doesn't have to be a stressful activity, where half the time you are stressing to hear what the other people are saying. 

Now we talk of connected TV, how is making news for connected TV different from linear TV?

While adapting to newer ways of doing news, I'm still the quintessential old-time reporter/journalist/ editor, call it what you will. I still believe in checking out and reaching out to original sources to be absolutely hands-on, meeting people to have the latest information, that is why the brand of stories we are known for.

I don't want to be pompous when I say this, but the kind of stories that the Navika Kumar brand on Times Now can do cannot be duplicated by somebody.  If I see something somewhere, I won't pick it up and put it on air, I will still go back, old style, old school, check it and then put it out.

How do you handle criticism and trolling?

I have broad shoulders. Initially, when I came onto social media, I was taken aback by all the trolls that followed. I pick up learnings if there are any, and now I really don't bother about it. And if trolls have time to go after you, then you are worth going after.

Prime Time anchors don't ask tough questions; they just soft pedal on important issues. Isn't that a fact?

Depends on whether you want to ask tough questions and have a growly face or you can ask tough and firm questions even with a deadpan expression on your face, or maybe even a slight sarcastic smile.

Everybody has their own personal style. By nature and by character I'm not a very growly person. I speak normally to people and I speak normally in my interviews as well. I feel sometimes form is important. You can't be discourteous; you can be firm and courteous and yet push the envelope. That is my style.

My style is not a growly, barky kind of style, and to each their own.  I like to maintain my Ps and Qs because if you begin to growl, then you should be prepared that the person in front of you may also growl at you and then it becomes a full-fledged slanging match. I'm not one for slanging matches.

What is your view on ratings, how do you make sense of the obsession with  ‘No. 1’ culture that drives newsrooms?

My sense is that we all should take a deep breath and sit back and not be driven by some blind competition that occurs every week. Credibility is way more important than the numbers and sometimes the No. 1s that you were talking about, somewhere at the bottom there will be a disclaimer that we were No 1 in segment X, category A or B , and there will be a very teeny weeny disclaimer at the bottom.

I think we should stop this pretence game that we do by flashing it every Thursday morning. Our vision has to be broader than that. We have get out of this weekly rate race and actually depend on the quality of work that we do.

Having said that, I know in the real world some ratings have to be there for benchmarks to be made and it should be continuously work in progress as to how to improve those benchmarks. As an industry and as journalists as management in various companies we must continue to do that and bring out a foolproof way of somewhere measurement of the real No 1’s in the market.

But somewhere or the other, this rate race of copying and running , making tall claims etc, there has to be some method in this madness that happens every week. I don't believe it is adding to the credibility of us as a genre, as an industry and in the end it is not going to end up helping any of us, as it is, there are too many of us. We have to focus on quality rather than just on some abstract numbers.

How do you deal with the complexity of handling bilingual newsrooms?

I believe I'm still a learner, I don't want to ever stop learning. When I completed around 13-14 years in print journalism, the chance to do television came along and I felt that somewhere midway in my career I was getting an opportunity to learn a new medium and let me go for it. And that is how television happened to me.

In TV, I have moved from being a reporter, being an editor to being the primetime face, which I never ever thought I would be, but I learnt and I'm still learning. These opportunities have come my way so i feel that every opportunity that comes your way and opens new avenues to keep learning, to keep growing , pushing your own frontiers, and the frontiers of the place where you work, is god sent and i continue to have the passion as I did on the day one of my career.

I don't find it so much of a challenge, because I'm not scared of failure. A lot of people keep asking me–how come you picked up Hindi? It's a totally different world, and I picked it up only because I said it can't be rocket science. I will wait and watch and learn. That is always the way I have kept an open mind. I learn from people who are my colleagues, I learn from juniors, I don't have any barriers in my mind that I know it all, or that I'm the fountainhead of all knowledge,

I keep asking-is my Hindi okay, is my expression okay, it's not that I don't know Hindi, but mine is colloquial. I manage to get my way around and I keep learning new things every day and that's the part I really enjoy. Whoever is directing me, whoever is my producer, I have a no-holds barred conversation and I learn from them. It's a seamless osmosis of learning, teaching, giving and taking and that is what makes this whole experience so vibrant. I'm in love with what I do.

When you are not in the newsroom, how do you spend your time?

I love to watch OTT at night to unwind– crime thrillers, dramas, all of that. I’m a night buff, after primetime, I go home and relax with some gibberish which I watch. Crime thrillers being my favourite, political dramas, legal series, anything that has a pacy kind of storyline.

I'm a great bollywood buff, I like SRK, Salman, Akshay and Ranbir, all of them. I’m not fixed on any one of them. But my all time favourite is Mr Bachchan. That baritone voice is something that I have grown up with. I haven't missed any of his  films, even the ones which flopped during a certain phase. I also loved to watch films by Muzaffar Ali, Imtiyaz Ali, Karan Johar, and like a true Punjabi I love grand sets, grandeur in films, nice jewellery and lehengas.

I'm into music a lot, I have done some training in classical music. I'm a great mom and a great daughter and I love to  spend time with the family.

How do you keep yourself updated amidst the daily hustle bustle of two newsrooms?

I had great training, I started as a business journalist at the Economic Times in Mumbai. By training I'm an Economics post graduate, so I understand budgets and the business and finance part of things and then I switched on to the Indian Express and I did most of my learning of investigative journalism at the Indian Express.

I read my daily share of newspapers, I'm always scrolling through social media to find out things that are trending and what people are talking about. However, even today, I make it a habit and a discipline to meet people everyday. By people I mean bureaucrats, politicians and people connected with the world of news.

Even when I have to keep tabs on two newsrooms, I still continue to maintain that discipline of meeting people and getting first hand stories.