There was a time when there was only one news bulletin at 9 o’ clock from the state television channel PTV. As PTV was the only channel there was no competition and having a rival is important for quality service. In current times we have so many channels and many of them are news channels.
Pakistani news channels have gained superiority over the entertainment channels to a certain extent and people prefer watching the news and current affairs programs instead of music and dramas. A person checking the news channels for the headlines after every 30 minutes has become a habit of his.
Some of the Pakistani news channels are enlisted here:
- Geo News
- ARY News
- PTV News
- Express News
- Samaa News
- Dunya News
- Aaj News
- Waqt News
- Din News
- Apna News
- Such TV
- City42
- Indus News
- Channel 5
- CNBC Pakistan
- Dawn News
- Khyber News
- News One
- Royal News
Out of these news channels Geo News, ARY News, Express News, PTV News, Samaa news, Aaj News, Dawn News, Dunya News, CNBC Pakistan and News One are considered as the top competitors while others are thought to be smaller ones.
The competition between these news channels is at its peak. Channels like Geo News, ARY News, Samaa News, Dunya News, Express news and so many other news channels compete with one another to become the top news channel and are always trying to get the get the top rankings and viewership. And the number of news channels is increasing as well. Which also means increasing competition for the above mentioned channels?
Metro One, Din News, City42, Waqt News, Apna news and Such TV are considered as small news channels because they have such bi competition in front of them in the form of Geo News, ARY News, Express, Samaa, Dunya and let’s not forget the state television’s news channel PTV News. Due to these top notch channels, the new channels are always trying to improve the content which they air.
The dual benefit of this competition between these news channels is that it also keeps the big guns like Geo news and ARY news etc that are considered as the top competitors of this competition to keep the level of their news and current affairs high.
Every news channel tries to take advantage of other’s mistake as in order to attract more viewers the news channels like Geo etc. tries to make their news spicy as much as possible. But in that process even the top news channels forget their responsibilities which they have on their shoulders and they create a sort of drama which is far away from the actual truth. One top competitor of this competition Geo News has made this mistake in the past many times and still does such acts.
One of the most recent acts of such sort is the news of the arrival of none other than Boom Boom Afridi and how he pushed and punched his fans at the airport. Geo news being the first news channel to break this news spiced it up drama and portrayed Shahid Afridi as a raging monster who attacked his fan for no reason. This act of Geo news highly annoyed its viewers while its competitor ARY News reported what actually happened. Geo news was blinded by the competition between the news channels and reported the matter irresponsibly which created a misunderstanding about the incident. As the 1st news channel of Pakistan, Geo news has the responsibility of not only reporting the truth but also to set an example for those news channels who considers it a competition in this field.
The above example shows that sometimes competition leads to negative acts by the competitors. These news channels have a responsibility to fulfill and especially channels like Geo News, ARY, Samaa and Express etc which has viewership all over the world. International media also follow these big guns and quote them for any kind of news such as the Shahid Afridi’s incident which Indian media quoted Geo News and showed the negative image of him to the rest of the world.
“Great power comes with great responsibility”. A message for all the news channels and I do hope that Pakistani news channels improve themselves with the help of this competition rather than creating a drama.