NDTV’s silent protest is loud

 10th March 2015    Good and Bad PR 
 Paarul Chand

NDTV goes off air and gains viewers

Over the weekend, NDTV 24x7 showed a blank screen during the one hour slot that had been planned for the telecast of banned documentary, India’s daughter, by British film maker Leslee Udwin – herself a rape survivor.

The documentary which includes a controversial interview with one of the perpetrators of the Nirbhaya 2012 rape case is part of the BBC's on-going Storyville series. 

The silent hour is a reminder of how papers such as The Indian Express protested censorship during the Emergency by printing blank columns.

The ban on the documentary has been a self-goal for the government as all it did was create unprecedented interest in the documentary in and out of India. It has also fuelled the perception that there is a series of attempts by the Government of India’s right wing ideological partner, the RSS, to govern aspects of personal life, this includes a ban on beef in the state of Maharashtra and a ban on the movie ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’.

Good PR for NDTV, terrible PR for the government.

Good comes out of the Woman’s Day hoopla

In the middle of women employees being greeted with cards and flowers at their offices, two organisations have made an attempt to cut through the clutter and do something meaningful and downright quirky!

Out of the gazillions of women’s day promos, the one created by Bengaluru based Nucleus PR stood out for its quirky use of the Superhero imagery. Here is a gang of girls that is embracing their inner Superhero! Watch:

 

Cashback and Coupons site CashKaro.com has launched #SheCEO on International Women’s Day – a campaign to provide women Entrepreneurs a platform to accelerate their growth.

The month long campaign will call for participation from startups run by women from across India and 3 winners will be selected by a panel of experts based on their submission. The initiative in partnership with NASSCOM 10,000 Startups, SHEROES.in & TheRodinhoods.com will celebrate the spirit of women-preneurs and will offer them advice on challenges like fundraising, talent acquisition and building good unit metrics for their business.

The 3 winners will get a direct entry to #WomenTechship – a program by NASSCOM 10,000 Startups and a mentor lunch with Swati & Rohan Bhargava – Founders, CashKaro.com.

A great way to actually help women and generate good PR – drawing from the fact that CashKaro’s co–founder, Swati Bhargava is a women entrepreneur in her early 30s.