TV coverage of the conflict is rage bait masquerading as news. How did India get here?
On Thursday, as the India-Pakistan crisis boiled over on Indian television screens, what followed wasn’t journalism – it was a full-blown circus. Panic, nationalism and pure noise surged in real time. Anchors shouted over each other. “Breaking” graphics danced across screens. By Friday morning, it was clear: what people had consumed wasn’t news. It was a frenzy of misinformation – unverified, sensational and largely fake.
A question echoed through group chats and social media timelines: Where do we go for real news? Who do we trust now?
Here’s the uncomfortable answer: you don’t get real news because you never really paid for it.
The problem isn’t just that audiences today won’t pay. It’s that journalism in India was never meant to be reader-funded. For over a century, advertising subsidised the Fourth Estate. Newspapers and magazines were built on ads. The mission was public service; the money came from private sponsorship. That model has collapsed. And nothing has replaced it.
The ad game is over -– and newsrooms lost
Today, most digital ad money no longer goes to media houses – it flows directly to tech giants. Why? Because these platforms (Google, Facebook and more) offer advertisers what journalism can’t: scale, attention and precision targetting. Algorithms now drive the sale.
Traditional media, once propped...
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