The times they are A-Difficult

By Vijaya Pushkarna Former Vice President Hamid Ansari presents the IPI Award for Excellence inJournalism 2019 to Nidhi Razdan, NDTV “We live in difficult times ,” M Hamid Ansari, former vice president observed. Ansari, who gave away the IPI award for excellence in the national capital on Friday, to NDTV referred to the traditional media’s job of seeking facts, forgoing fiction, and coping with objective and subjective difficulties that inevitably confront any journalist. While he was confident that the high standards set by the award winning channel would be sustained and even improved upon, Ansari was quick to add,“This is easier said than done.” Coincidentally it was the day when the Ministry for Information and Broadcasting slapped a 48-hour ban on two channels—Asia News and Media One News -- for “questioning the RSS, and being critical of the Delhi Police”. It pertained to the coverage of the Delhi riots on Feb 25. The former v