Where’s My Migraine, Asks a Pakistani Who Watched Arnab’s Republic

For Ahmer Naqvi, Arnab’s hairdo resembles an ageing musician “trying to marry ridiculousness with grace”.

Republic’s Arnab Goswami. (Photo Courtesy: mansworld.in)

Seen Arnab Goswami’s provocative ‘Pakistan’s Migraine’ poster for his newly-launched venture Republic? More importantly, remember how a Pakistani journalist on Twitter mistook Goswami’s larger-than-life picture in the poster to be that of Bollywood actor Riteish Deshmukh? Well, that naturally generated a lot of traction on social media, including a witty reply from the actor himself.

Now, call it fate or whatever you want, but that bumbling tweet actually made a journalist from Pakistan – Ahmer Naqvi – watch Republic, perhaps to explore what makes the channel his country’s “migraine”.

And the end result was a blog where he tastefully shares his experiences, with quite a few incisive comments to make on everything ranging from Arnab’s hairdo, the mountain of text flashing on the screen, to finally the burning question – how is Republic Pakistan’s migraine?

First Things First, The Funny Parts

Naqvi kicks off his commentary by comparing Arnab’s hairdo with that of “an ageing hair-metal guitarist trying to marry ridiculousness with grace”.

He then moves on to question the “SUPER EXCLUSIVE” label emphatically put on the first story that the channel ‘broke’ – the Lalu-Shahabuddin conversation tapes. He ultimately compares the exclusive with “discovering that Inzamam ul-Haq is fond of nihari”. Oh, and according to him, listening to these tapes is like “eavesdropping on a conversation at Eid lunch”.

Naqvi also seems to have expressed his disapproval over the fact that the channel devoted one whole news day to just one story, a move he has “never seen”. Not to forget that he regards the “overwhelming” on-screen graphics of the channel, replete with “five bars of text”, as more PR-driven (self-congratulatory) than being informative/newsy.

Also Read: Who Is Paying Arnab’s Republic TV To Be “Our Voice”?

Now, Getting to the Generics

Naqvi points out how an Indian channel like Republic is different from the ones in Pakistan – the English-language flowing naturally and accepted easily in the case of the former as compared to the latter. However, he does question Republic’s ‘global’ nature, citing, most importantly, its lack of information, and translations for a non-Hindi audience.

But what about the conversation on Pakistan, which Naqvi was waiting for throughout, given that his very motivation for watching the channel possibly stemmed out from the ‘Pakistan’s Migraine’ poster? This is what he had to say about it:

I’d say the worst thing about the channel is that it took me five (sporadic) hours of watching to stop feeling ignored.

Then finally when the Pakistan reference did come in the form Shahabuddin being labelled as an ISI agent, Naqvi commented on the “marvellous speed at which the theory evolved” from speculation to implication to fact, comparable to a passing Nazi reference.

But Naqvi’s comments about the Republic channel and its relationship with India are summed up best towards the end, when he says:

…if this is the direction in which Republic is going, then it’s pretty clear that rather than the migraine for Pakistan’s establishment, Arnab plans to be its aphrodisiac.

Republic, ‘Pakistan’s Migraine’, are you listening?

Read Naqvi’s full blog here.

Also Read: Lessons From Arnab on Staying in the News When Not Doing the News