Even as the media industry is recovering from the shock of mass firings at the Outlook and the Network 18 groups, Prime News, a bilingual news channel based in Assam, has shut shop leaving its 170 odd employees in the lurch. While there has expectedly been little mention of the development in the mainstream “mainland” media, it has created quite a stir in Guwahati. Journalists cutting across organisations have come together to protest against what they believe was a grossly unfair and unjust move on the part of the Prime News management. It will of course be always debatable whether the closure was yet another victim of the gloomy economy or just a result of bad management.

Prime News’ stint in the highly competitive broadcast news market of Assam had always been troubled ever since its launch two and a half years ago. The channel was not a part of the Direct-to-Home (DTH) network and had to rely completely on local cable operators for distribution. To make matters worse, their founding company – the Jeevan Suraksha Group – is being investigated for its involvement in the infamous chit fund scam that rocked West Bengal last year and the owner, Chandan Das, was arrested. It was in September 2012 that the new owners, Rockland Media Private Limited, took over.  It has been a constant downslide ever since. Things went from bad to worse at the beginning of September this year when the Assam Cable Connection Network (ACCN) – an umbrella organisation of local cable television operators in Assam – declined to air the channel citing non-payment of the annual carriage fee. As a result Prime News became almost invisible on televisions across the state and TRPs plummeted to a new low. However, the final blow came on September 29, 2013 when the management in a meeting with senior editorial staff conveyed their inability to run the channel any longer. Within a day, on September 30, Prime News downed shutters rendering a whole bunch of people jobless.

Although the idea of a news channel shutting down in a span of less than 24 hours comes across as shocking, it was not a totally unforeseen development. There had always been apprehensions about Prime News’ ability to survive for too long in what is a volatile market. Also, this was not the first occasion that the management decided to shut shop all of a sudden. The previous month, the management decided to dissolve the English and Hindi desks of the channel in spite of having insisted only days earlier that no downsizing was on the cards. Rhiddhis Chakravorty, a senior editor with the channel, alleged the management invariably downplayed any concerns about the health of the organisation, which was fragile for a variety of reasons. “The management would never acknowledge that there was a problem, and when things went out of control, they simply decided to shut down the channel without even giving any sort of a notice period,” said Chakravorty. He added that they weren’t even given a formal letter stating the reason for the sudden closure.

Abhijit Gogoi, who was input-output editor with Prime News, also expressed disappointment at the shoddy manner in which they shut down. “How do I expect anybody to employ me since I do not even have a written intimation by my employers? What is really surprising is that in spite of repeated enquiries over the last few months, we were kept totally in the dark,” lamented Gogoi.

Nava Thakuria, the secretary of the Journalists’ Federation of Assam, in a telephonic conversation with Newslaundry pointed towards a phenomenon he termed as the “corporatisation of the media”. A senior editor who had resigned from the channel a few months ago because of uncongenial working conditions echoed the same sentiments. He said, “Corporates with oodles of political and financial clout but no knowledge whatsoever of how the media functions have ventured into the industry these days and that has led to the quagmire that the industry is in now.”

A little bit of digging reveals that his concerns are not misplaced. Prime News’ owners Rockland Media Private Limited are a part of the Brahmaputra Group – primary a real estate company that had nothing to do with the media prior to buying Prime News. It is hardly surprising that their attempt at running a news channel ended up in a failure of epic proportions that has resulted in immense collateral damage.  However, there seems to be more than just inexperience that resulted in the collapse of the company. A reporter with the channel on the condition of anonymity told Newslaundry that for the last six months all salaries were being paid in cash. In fact, he also goes on to say that the final settlements, which were done within a period of 24 hours, and amounted to more than Rs. 1 crore were in cash too. Was there more to it than  meets the eye? This is where it is important to delve into the track record of the Prime News proprietors.

The Brahmaputra Group, which has huge amounts of investments in the state of Assam, has often been at the receiving end of many corruption and embezzlement allegations. The Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS), a farmers’ organisation led by RTI activist Akhil Gogoi has been relentlessly campaigning against what they claim is illegal occupation of hundreds of acres of farmland by the group. Gogoi, in a telephonic conversation, told Newslaundry, “Suresh Prithani, the face of the company in Assam, has been a long standing beneficiary of the Tarun Gogoi led Congress state government’s largesse. In fact, Prithani’s proximity to Tarun Gogoi is something anybody living in Assam will vouch for. The news channel was just an excuse to legitimise their black money and now that the motive is achieved, they have washed their hands off.”

When Newslaundry contacted Ram Avatar, a close aide of Suresh Prithani, he blamed the Assam Cable Communication Network for demanding an “unreasonable amount” on the pretext of carriage fees. However, that is an allegation the ACCN’s Sanjiv Narain describes as rubbish. Narain said, “ The carriage fee is as prescribed by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and we asked for exactly the same amount they had been paying for the last two years. The truth is that they wanted to wash their hands off the channel and blaming us is an easy way to do it”. Narain further added that in spite of clearly not being to handle the business, the Brahmaputra Group was for some strange reason reluctant to sell it in spite of quite a few interested buyers.

Ram Avatar, though, denied that were any genuine offers to buy the channel. He also sees nothing wrong in shutting down the channel and believes “I can do whatever I want to do with business”. He also said that all dues were cleared and employees were also paid three to four months of salary (depending on their income slab) as compensation.

The incident is disturbingly telling of the purely market driven circus, some media houses in India have been reduced to. The lack of any concrete guidelines by the TRAI and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on ownership of news channels only contributes to the disarray that the Indian media is currently in. One could say though it’s only fair in a country where there is a conflict on ownership of TV channels between the regulatory body  – TRAI – and the government itself.  But the show must and will go on – regulations or not.