NEW DELHI: The Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) and News Broadcasters Association (NBA) have spoken up against Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s call to ban all advertising by state governments and public-sector undertakings for a period of two years, requesting her to withdraw the suggestion. “On one hand, there has been a slump in advertisement revenues of electronic media due to recession, on the other, it is suffering from financial blows due to the nationwide lockdown of all industries and businesses.
Moreover, news channels are spending heavily on providing safety to their reporters and production staff," NBA said in a statement, calling the proposal for ban not only ill-timed, but highly arbitrary.