Many of you have been asking if “Faking News” show on the Hindi news channel IBN-7, hosted by television personality Cyrus Broacha, has got anything to do with this website. I thought to document it here to escape answering the same question again and again.
Faking News, the leading news satire website of India, has got absolutely no relationship or affiliation whatsoever with the weekly television show of the same name currently being aired by the Hindi news channel IBN-7.
It should be noted that IBN-7 had started the concerned show sometime in the first week of April 2010, whereas Faking News, this website, had existed and had been faking news since 15th September 2008 (earlier on the blogger platform but with the same domain name).
I had taken up this matter with IBN-7 team and had apprised them of my apprehensions and concerns way back in March 2010 itself, arguing that it was not proper of them to start a television show in the same genre when a website of the same name existed and had been popular for long.
They defended their decision by claiming that their show was called “Pheking News”, which literally meant “throwing news” in Hindi, but was written the same as “Faking News” in the devanagri script.
(This sounds a lame excuse, and as one of my dear friends suggested me, I should have responded by saying, “okay, thanks for clarifying, phuck you!”)
But I decided to leave things as it were and didn’t start any online campaign to pressurize IBN-7 to get the name of the show changed, as I thought it might have appeared as an attention-seeking activity.
Also, I didn’t have any trademark registered for the phrase “Faking News” at that time, and neither had I enough money or resources to fight any legal battle. Furthermore, honestly, the phrase “Faking News” had been used by some commentators to mock the term “Breaking News” on a few occasions before I decided to start the website by the same name, hence, in a way, I had not “invented” the phrase.
But with all (im)modesty and with truthfulness, I would claim that it was this website that established the phrase “Faking News” as a popular news satire term in India, and hence IBN-7 should have exercised discretion while starting a news satire show with the same name.
Nonetheless, the bottom line is – this website has got nothing to do with the weekly television show “Faking News with Cyrus Broacha” aired by Hindi news channel IBN-7.
We too hope to come up with our own video based show some day, and that would be “the real Faking News show”, so please wish us all the luck!
Regards,
Pagal Patrakar
12 July 2010, New Delhi.
Faking News with Cyrus Broacha, not with Pagal Patrakar
