Barkha Dutt, one of the most recognised and respected personalities in Indian broadcast journalism, has spent the last 13 years informing, educating, refuting, challenging, questioning, debating, reporting and retorting on television.
Visiting Dubai recently to launch NDTV Arabia, the television host and managing editor of NDTV 24x7 talked to XPRESS.
"As a journalist it feels so peculiar to be on this side of the table answering questions. I'm so much more comfortable asking them. You have to be on the other side to know how tough it feels," she said.
Dutt said the aim of NDTV Arabia is to serve as a medium that will reconnect expatriate Indians to "Mother India".
"NDTV Arabia will be more than an umbilical cord. It is going to build on certain themes that are specific to the notion of being an Indian who left India a while ago.
"Some of the themes we'd like to explore here include the notion of ‘Indianness'; what it means for people living outside India; how India relates to NRIs (non-resident Indians); and how differently the second generation of Indians has culturally evolved from their urban Indian counterparts back home.
"We'd like to explore what sort of cultural and political sensibilities they have grown up with. Also, the fact that Dubai is a confluence of religions, cultures and nationalities lends itself to some interesting programming," she said.
Dutt's File
Barkha Dutt's frontline reporting of the Kargil conflict in 1999 made her a household name. Since then the focus of her work has been conflict reporting, covering areas ranging from Kashmir and Pakistan to Afghanistan and Iraq.
Today, as the Managing Editor of NDTV 24x7, India's premiere satellite television network, and the host of We the People every week, she is one of the most influential journalists in India.
