Senior journalist Ravish Kumar resigns from NDTV following Adani acquisition

A senior journalist, Ravish Kumar has resigned from NDTV according to news sources. This comes just a day after the channel’s founders and promoters Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy resigned from their positions as directors on the board of RRPR Holding Private Limited (RRPRH). The senior jounalists resignation come after the news channel was acquired by the Adani Group, and holds 29.18% stake in the news channel.

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Prannoy Roy and his wife Radhika Roy had resigned as Directors on the Board of RRPR Holding Private Limited just yesterday, the company said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday. The board of RRPR Holding has approved the appointment of Sudipta Bhattacharya, Sanjay Pugalia and Senthil Sinniah Chengalvarayan as Directors on its board with immediate effect.

Career of Ravish Kumar in NDTV:

Kumar, a winner of the Ramon Magsaysay award, used to host a number of programs including the channel’s flagship weekday show Hum Log, Ravish ki Report, Des Ki Baat, and Prime Time. He has also been conferred with the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award twice.

Whole story of the acquisition:

• Adani group in August bought VCPL and sought to convert the warrants into shares. NDTV promoters initially opposed the move saying they were not consulted but earlier this week relented and allowed the conversion, which gave VCPL a 99.5 per cent stake in RRPR Holding.
• With Adani group controlled entity VCPL firmly in the saddle of RRPR Holdings, the Roys resigned as directors of the company.
• RRPR, or Radhika Roy Prannoy Roy Holdings Private Limited, till now was classified as a promoter entity. It held 29.18 per cent stake in the news channel. Prannoy Roy holds 15.94 per cent of NDTV and Radhika Roy another 16.32 per cent (together 32.26 per cent).
• Post acquisition of VCPL, Adani group launched an open offer to acquire a 26 per cent stake in NDTV. That offer opened on November 22, and will close on December 5.
• The offer has so far got offers for 53.27 lakh shares or a third of the entire open offer size. This despite the deep discount of the open offer price in comparison to the current stock levels.
• NDTV stock is trading up 5 per cent at Rs 447.70 on the BSE as against Adani group’s open offer price of Rs 294 apiece.
• The ports-to-energy conglomerate is seeking as much as 1.67 crore shares or 26 per cent of equity from NDTV’s minority investors.
• A successful open offer will give Adani group a controlling stake of just over 55 per cent and it may then seek to oust Roys from the board of the channel. Pugalia is the chief executive officer and editor-in-chief of media initiatives at Adani Group.