MUMBAI: TV Today Network has relaunched its big-ticket Hindi show Seedhi Baat. The show will be hosted by Sweta Singh, news anchor and executive editor of special programming at Aaj Tak.
The first episode of the show, which will air at 8 pm on 24 March, will feature BJP president Amit Shah as the guest.
TV Today Network managing editor Supriya Prasad said, “Seedhi Baat aims to have blunt straight talk with various leaders of the industry. It embodies a tough-as-nails approach to interviews. One-on-one hard-hitting conversations with powerful leaders, celebrities, tycoons and so forth as opposed to noisy debates.”
The guests in Seedhi Baat will be from across a variety of sectors - UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath and Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia to name a few from politics and Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar and Shah Rukh Khan from Bollywood while Virat Kohli and Hardik Pandya from the world of sports. The channel intends to approach prime minister Narendra Modi and Congress president Rahul Gandhi.
“Sweta is one of our most experienced journalists. She has tremendous exposure to news coverage. She has interviewed politicians, cricketers, international leaders, actors. But above all, her style of interviewing is direct without being fierce. She asks straight questions but does not shout down her guests,” added Prasad.
The promotions of the show will run all through the year. The network will also have a driver program running up to the 2019 elections. Out of home campaigns will run in Delhi and major cities in Uttar Pradesh as well as the old mix of outdoor, TV, radio, print and social media.
Speaking on the opportunity, Singh said, “I will be direct, tough and assertive. But I don’t believe in cutting my guest mid sentence. Seedhi Baat is a huge brand and I will put in all efforts to uphold the dignity, neutrality and credibility of the show.”
She believes that the show will deliver what the audiences are looking for. “The audiences want to hold power to account. They want honest answers. They want to see the reality, the truth. Seedhi Baatpromises to deliver all of that. It's assertive but not noisy. The show has a proud history. It has had leaders like Narendra Modi facing tough questions. It featured superstars of the stature of Salman Khan and Amitabh Bachchan. Our Seedhi Baat with them is still etched in public memory,” she said.
Seedhi Baat is iconic for its earlier host Prabhu Chawla who won several awards for the show and for his style of asking direct and to-the-point questions. After his departure from the India Today group in 2010, the show was taken over by MJ Akbar.
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