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Should ANI be described as acting as a "mouthpiece" of the Indian government (regardless as to whether this description is attributed or not)? Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:53, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it is a mouthpiece and should be mentioned as such. Articles across Wikipedia have used this word for various outlets. I don't see any sincere objection. Dympies (talk) 03:27, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
All editors agree they are a "mouthpiece" but some are saying we need to find a better word. Which one is it? First suggest it then only we can move forward. Ratnahastin(talk)03:36, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Mouthpiece" is not correct, which would imply that everything that ANI puts out is at the behest of the government. Some of what ANI did, e.g., producing programmes for the government television channel in Kashmir, is of this kind. But in general, it is not. The reality is that ANI voluntarily aligns itself to peddle the government point of view, probably selectively, in order to curry favours with the government and enlarge its business. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 08:49, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Priopaganda tool" is exactly correct. The full wording was "accused of having served as a propaganda tool of incumbent governments". I am unhappy that we are being forced to defend the WP:STATUSQUO, whereas the normal protocol is to put the WP:ONUS on those wanting a change. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 08:52, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For payments ranging from Rs 48 lakh to Rs 1.5 crore per year, ANI deploys a team for each chief minister who’s signed up and covers all events involving them. It also promises to globally promote said chief ministers' image by "leveraging its partnership with Reuters".
For instance, on August 9, 2016, Asian Films TV Private Ltd sent a proposal to then Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao [KCR] offering its services for Rs 1.5 crore per year ... Newslaundry has a copy of this email. Gaur [an ANI official] said Mittal [Telangana’s information and public relations commissioner] wanted "more" from the ANI contract and had allegedly asked how the news service could help build KCR's "image" in India and abroad. In his email to Ishaan [director of ANI; editor of its feed], Gaur wrote: "ANI can dedicate one camera team with CM for his publicity...and send important messages and statements to various regional and national channels." A former employee of ANI confirmed to Newslaundry that ANI’s camera team subsequently tailed KCR and covered key events involving him and his government ...
In Uttar Pradesh, the information and PR department signed a contract with ANI, a few months after Yogi Adityanath became chief minister in 2017. In Rajasthan, two officials confirmed that the former Ashok Gehlot government had also signed a "PR package" with ANI ... In Chhattisgarh, the former Bhupesh Baghel government signed a similar contract with ANI when he became chief minister in 2018 ...
They [Newslaundry's sources] also pointed out that, at the end of the day, ANI is all about business. "UNI and PTI are run by trusts. But ANI runs a business like the Ambanis, Tatas or Birlas," they said. "It has made it clear that they are not devoted to journalism but business. They follow the money. You give it to them, they can do anything." Yet two sources in the Congress [primary opposition to the incumbent BJP government] complained that such agreements were limited to states. "We wanted ANI to give positive coverage to our central leadership too. But because of ANI's proximity to the central government, it did not happen."
ANI also has short-term deals with companies and union ministries, according to two former employees. An internal email from 2016, accessed by Newslaundry, said ANI would cover the Confederation of Indian Industry's events – project launches, press conferences, agreement signings, and others – for Rs 8 lakh per event. Additionally, ANI offered to live-stream CII events on the union power ministry’s Facebook page – just another instance of its proximity to the central government.
To sweeten the deal, the news agency said it would leverage its Reuters partnership for international publicity ... Newslaundry asked Reuters if it was aware of such "PR packages" and how it verified ANI's videos were not publicity material. Reuters said it "selects and verifies a small amount of globally relevant ANI videos for its video service, which is made available to customers via our wire". It’s not clear how it cross-checks "PR" videos of ANI.
Reuters did not answer Newslaundry’s question on whether such contracts violated Reuters' Code of Business Conduct and Ethics, and Trust Principles. The code says journalists "must not accept any payment, gift, service or benefit" from a news source of contact. The code demands the highest standard of integrity and ethics and is applicable to business partners (ANI, in this case) too.
It's worth mentioning that ANI worries about the Prakash family’s public image too.
Newslaundry learned that in 2022, Ishaan held a meeting with content curators of Wikipedia to discuss "positive" descriptions of ANI on the open-source platform. He allegedly expressed his displeasure that whenever a "positive" detail was added to ANI's Wikipedia page, someone would cite the 2019 report from The Caravan magazine on how ANI "reports the government’s version of the truth".
At the time of publishing this story, ANI's Wikipedia page says the news agency has been criticised for "having served as a propaganda tool for the incumbent central government, distributing materials from a vast network of fake news website, and misreporting".
@Valereee My unsubstantiable guess is that Ishaan contacted some people who are active in the Wikimedia movement in India — that is, those who show up for editathons, hackathons, tech summits, etc. — and mostly edit sister Wikipedias. The overall sentiment at WikimediaIndia-l (thread: Court Verdict on Wikipedia) is interesting. TrangaBellam (talk) 12:09, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The alleged bias [mentioned in Wikipedia's lead] in covering its clients manifests in ANI’s tweets.
Newslaundry analysed two of ANI’s regional accounts on X – the first for Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, and the second devoted to Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. All five states are governed by the BJP. The key finding is that every second tweet from the two handles is on chief ministers. Opposition voices find little space on both timelines ...
At the national level, ANI’s YouTube channel posted 92 video packages between March 31 and April 2. More than half (49) featured BJP leaders and pro-government voices. Only 13 videos had bytes of opposition leaders ... Finally, we looked closer at Smita Praksh’s ANI Podcast. With 155 episodes since September 2022, she’s invited 70 BJP and pro-government personalities so far. Seventeen were opposition leaders or anti-establishment ...
The news agency is clearly selective in what it chooses to cover – and what it reliably skips. When activist Sonam Wangchuk held a 21-day fast for Sixth Schedule safeguards in Ladakh [against the BJP government], ANI only tweeted once, when Wangchuk ended his fast. On February 24, the Uttar Pradesh government [run by BJP] cancelled a recruitment exam for 60,000 police constable posts due to a paper leak and rescheduled it for six months later. Candidates held outraged protests over the cancellation. But on X, ANI posted two videos that day in the span of two hours. The first showed students celebrating the announcement and the second had interviews with them, with the caption "Yogi ji ne maang puri ki" [lit. "Yogi Ji has fulfilled our demands"] as candidates had "crazy celebrations" over the cancelling of the exam. There was no post on the protests preceding celebrations ...
ANI’s star with Modi seems to be on the rise. The news agency had around 10 camera teams, including from Delhi, in Ayodhya on January 22. Smita Prakash, Ishaan and Naveen Kapoor were among the invitees there that day.
It’s also the only non-government media organisation to travel abroad with Modi. When former PM Manmohan Singh went to Myanmar for his last foreign tour in March 2014, he took along 30 journalists apart from Doordarshan. When Modi went on his first foreign trip to Bhutan that year, he took only four journalists from PTI and ANI. Four years later, only one journalist – from ANI – was allowed to fly with Modi to Argentina. Additionally, Smita has interviewed Modi three times in 2014, 2019 and 2022 – an enviable record for her considering the prime minister has never held a press conference in India.
A former ANI journalist told Newslaundry that ANI is “the most loved child” of the BJP government.
In the words of a former employee, ANI and the Prakash family have no permanent foes and friends. During the JNU protest and arrests of student leaders in 2016, ANI blacklisted Shehla Rashid from being interviewed due to her "fiery views against the government". Rashid, who has of late been praising Modi for development in Kashmir, was interviewed by Smita in November last year.
ANI is also guilty of selectively revealing the religions of people accused of crimes. In other words, it tells readers if the perpetrators are Muslim, but doesn't extend the same courtesy to perpetrators who are Hindu.
For example, in June 2023, a woman's throat was allegedly slit by her Hindu boyfriend in an autorickshaw in Mumbai. In another case in November that year, a woman was allegedly murdered by a married Muslim man in Chandigarh. ANI tweeted the name of the accused in the second case, but not in the first. And it's done this many, many times.
An ANI employee blamed this on "lack of clarity" from editors. "There are no clear editorial directions on whether we need to mention names of all accused," they said. Given this, the source suggested that young employees tweeting from the handle choose a path that aligns with their bosses' 'pro-government' stance.
But while all media houses inevitably make the occasional mistake, ANI’s often seem deliberate.
For example, when Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal was arrested last month in the excise policy case, his minister Atishi held a press conference. She said companies connected to another accused in the case, P Sarath Chandra Reddy, had donated electoral bonds worth Rs 55 crore to the BJP after Reddy turned approver. ANI tweeted a 3.55-minute video of Atishi’s press conference. But the video cut off the portion where the minister alleged a quid pro quo arrangement between Reddy and the BJP. The tweet skipped it too.
Similarly in February, Congress leader Syed Naseer Hussain was elected to the Rajya Sabha. The BJP claimed "pro-Pakistan" slogans were raised by his supporters and filed a police complaint. ANI turned a claim into reality, alleging Hussain and his supporters did in fact raise pro-Pakistan slogans. In 2017, ANI tweeted that 15 men were arrested in Madhya Pradesh for "raising pro-Pak slogans and bursting crackers" after Pakistan beat India in a cricket match. It presented these details as fact, though all the men would be acquitted by a court six years later.
Newslaundry!!! That could be dubious. Founder Madhu Trehan convicted by court. TV Today Network takes Newslaundry to court, seeks Rs 2 crore in damages. NL Could not be considered reliable. [1]Bajajkunior (talk) 13:51, 3 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You're welcome to start a discussion on WP:RSN. Just at face value, a founder convicted of "something" and being taken to source would not remotely disqualify a source. Ravensfire (talk) 15:22, 3 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's the helpful information beyond vague accusations that's needed here. Helps demonstrate the integrity and willingness to do the right thing about the founder and personally, makes the attempted character assassination from Bajajkunior look worse. Concur about the obvious. Ravensfire (talk) 17:30, 3 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Need for a community response to WMF on revealing an Indian editor's identity
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
Discussions on Wikipedia:Village pump (WMF) have revealed that WMF intends to reveal the identity of an Indian editor to a Dehli Court on 8 November. There seems to be support for a community response to dissuade WNF from taking such action but I'm afraid I'm not familiar with the procedures involved. It has been suggested a letter should be drafted to WMF expressing our concerns. I could draft such a letter but need advice on how to proceed further.--Ipigott (talk) 17:56, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The future of the community appears very bleak if the news that WMF is giving up the personal information of Wikipedia editors and disclosing their identities is accurate, as reported in various media. This creates the impression that the editors and the larger community are in charge of the edits, so I will suggest the following community response.
Every Wikipedia article must be owned by an administrator, who will also handle any disputes or legal ramifications arising from the article.
The editing community need not have to be anonymous; Wikipedia editors must be identified. This will stop undesired edits, edit Wars & sock puppetry.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Weren't the above two discussions to remove the attributions and partially re-add the previously removed text? Is there any reason as to why we still haven't done it, or am i misunderstanding something here? Lunar-akaunto／talk18:44, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There's no consensus to re-add the mistreatment of employees material per WP:ONUS. There's also currently no consensus for the "mouthpiece" wording in the lead section, so I reworded it. You can re-add something related to misinformation if you'd like. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:53, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Not the employees bit; I was talking about misinformation and quoting non-existent sources. What about the attribution? Lunar-akaunto／talk19:07, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No surprise there Arnab has been talking about it for a while now... Would honestly be odd if he never jumped on the bandwagon, I've been following his career since the Times Now days and I've never noticed him pass up a chance to steal the spotlight. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:55, 6 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Arnab was an invited speaker at the first Wikiconference held in India in 2011! Seems like all the youtube videos from that conference have been removed! Shyamal (talk) 03:21, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
ANI has spread the news that Canada's Trudeau government "blocked" the "social media handles and page" of The Australia Today (actually run by overseas Indians) after it covered a press conference featuring Indian minister S Jaishankar. Indian media has been talking non-stop about this alleged censorship in light of tensions over the Nijjar case.
Correct. The Hindu reported something similar but shortly took it down afterwards for factual inaccuracy. Debunked rightly by The Wire and BOOM Live. Even day they call out Wikipedia for fake news (which is NOT fake news), and odd day rampantly do the same. Godi media for a reason, huh. Lunar-akaunto／talk08:28, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This request for help from administrators has been answered. If you need more help or have additional questions, please reapply the {{admin help}} template, or contact the responding user(s) directly on their own user talk page.
Since this article is the subject of an active court case in India, with the Delhi High Court having asked the WMF to identify editors who have edited it, there should be an edit notice warning editors. Something like: "Warning: This article is the subject of a current court case in India. If you edit it, your edit may become part of legal action, including a request for your IP to be revealed to the court." Since the article is under CTOP, I believe the edit notice should be imposed by an administrator. (Also, I don't think I have the technical competence required to add it.)
@Firefangledfeathers: I suggest something along the lines that Yngvadottir has proposed. It's factual and neutral; the current one may well be "short and precise", but it's highly inflammatory, something the WMF obviously wants to avoid. I mean, I know WMF–community relations can sometimes be frosty (verging on Arctic), but are we deliberately going out of our way to poke the bear?For what it's worth, I think it's a pretty inappropriate use of advanced tools to create such a template despite calls for a consensus to be found first, being our established approach. The case has been ongoing for ~five months, a few more hours/days will make little difference. SerialNumber5412915:55, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That edit notice is highly inappropriate. It implies that whoever wrote it is threatening to sue any editor who edits the article. Take it down immediately and wait for a consensus version. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:12, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that Launchballer's wording is provocative. I don't think there should be a link to the protest letter. Maybe to the section within the article? I believe the mention of a current case makes for enough of a warning. But I do think there is some urgency; the chilling effect is unfortunately real because of the WMF's response. Yngvadottir (talk) 20:33, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Propoganda" word is gone!!! But I don't think that this will make ANI any more relaxed. The Indian editor will simply become more troubled by your logic. Lunar, Hold back your reasoning for a while. Djano Chained (talk) 14:03, 9 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
