NT Awards honours TV news industry

NEW DELHI: The year gone by, 2010, was by no means an easy one for media persons who had to face newer challenges such as the Commonwealth Games coverage and its aftermath, and the exposes into the large number of scams.

The News Television Awards instituted by Indiantelevision.com, therefore, were all the more well-deserved because they were selected by juries comprising peers of the staffers of various television news channels.

Presented at a glittering evening at the resplendent Convention Hall of Hotel Ashok in the capital, the awards were received amidst a cheers and huge ovation – even as there was a serious moment when all stood in silence to rue the fact a child dies almost every seventeen seconds in this country because of reasons ranging from diseases to malnutrition.

The popularity of the awards – which were the first to be introduced four years earlier for television news channels – is also evident of the fact that awards were given not just in English and Hindi, but also for news channels in Telugu and Marathi. And with over a hundred awards in 32 categories, the NT Awards have become the widest ranging awards in the television news industry.

Rajdeep Sardesai (CNN IBN) and Deepak Chaurasia (Star News) took home the best TV news presenter of the year awards in English and Hindi. Karan Thapar took away two awards for his current affairs show Devil’s Advocate (CNN IBN), while Vinod Dua also received an award for primetime news cast on NDTV India.
  
     
  Parimal Kumar of NDTV India got the TV news reporter award, while Siddharth Sharma of Star News got the news anchor award. Rajiv Masand of CNN IBN and Siddharth Hussain of Star News got the entertainment critic awards.

Some of the shows that won awards include NDTV 24×7’s The Big Fight which got two awards for public debate and news show, Headlines Today’s Ground Zero (Best Presented Popular News Show); CNN IBN’s Face the Nation (Popular News Show); IBN7’s Zindagi Live (News Talk Show) on child sex abuse; CNBC Awaaz’s Tech Guru (Technology Based Show); and Aman ka Pul on NDTV India (current affairs programmes).

Among the awards given to English news channels, CNN-IBN received 19, while NDTV 24×7 received five, followed by three for CNBC-TV 18 and two each for Bloomberg UTV and Headlines Today.

In Hindi, NDTV India received 10 awards followed Star News (9), three by CNBC Awaaz and TV Today group (one each for Aajtak, Delhi Aajtak, and Tez), two each for IBN7 and TV9 Mumbai and one for P7 news channel.

10 awards in Marathi went to IBN Lokmat, followed by four to Zee24 Taas and three to Star Majha.

In Telugu, TV9 Telugu and Mahaa TV got seven awards each, followed by HMTV (five), Sakshi TV (four), Vanitha TV (three), and TV5 (one).

The categories included almost everything from auto shows to business programmes, anchors to presenters and reporters, talk shows to investigative shows, crime shows to promotional, entertainment news to entertainment features, and documentaries. There was a special prize this year for the best news content by a news channel on the internet, and also awards for the best social and environmental programmes, apart from lifestyle, fashion and technology awards.

The award ceremony, presented by Kavita Kaushik and Manish Paul, saw glitterati of personalities giving away the awards. These included former Minister of State for the Ministry of External Affairs Shashi Tharoor and wife Sunanda Pushkar, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao; Central Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah, dancers Raja Reddy with Radha and Kausalya, Sonal Man Singh, and Shovana Narayan; singer Penaz Masani; Indiantelevision.com founder CEO and Editor-in-Chief Anil Wanvari, Anoop Wanvari, Roop Sharma who represents the Cable Operators Federation of India, artist Madhu Jain, Kanwar Sandhu of ‘Day and Night’ TV, golfer Neelam Rudy, TV host and food critic Rashmi Uday Singh, activist Jaya Jaitley, Kapil Arora of Ernst and Young, and designer Ritu Kumar among others.

The function was interspersed with good hearted fun of news presentation, mostly touching upon the way news channels deal with corruption and scams.