The BBC has announced the transfer of its Indian employees and operations to a newly established company, Collective Newsroom Pvt. Ltd (CNPL). This move aims to comply with India’s Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) regulations, which limit foreign ownership in digital news publications to 26%.
Four senior BBC India employees have resigned to establish and manage CNPL: Rupa Jha (Senior News Editor), Mukesh Sharma (Editorial Head – BBC’s African Languages), Sanjoy Majumder (Deputy Managing Editor), and Sara Hassan (General Manager).
CNPL will be owned and operated entirely by Indians, with the four aforementioned individuals joined by five other BBC India members as shareholders. These include Sriram Gopisetty (Telugu Editor), Thangavel Appachi (Tamil Editor), Shashank Chouhan (Senior News Editor), Atul Garg (News Operations Manager), and Kiran Chahal (Human Resources Specialist).
CNPL will assume responsibility for producing all content for the BBC in Hindi, Gujarati, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, and Marathi. Additionally, it will handle the creation of all content for Indian digital platforms and the Indian YouTube channel in English.
All employees currently working on content published in India, encompassing the six Indian language services and digital English content, will be transferred to CNPL.
“The BBC’s presence in India has a rich history of prioritising its audiences,” stated Jonathan Munro, Deputy CEO of BBC News. “We warmly welcome the formation of Collective Newsroom, which continues this tradition. The BBC will receive first-class content from Collective Newsroom, content deeply rooted in India and aligned with the editorial standards audiences expect from the BBC. We look forward to a fruitful working relationship.”
This restructuring ensures the BBC’s continued presence and engagement with Indian audiences while complying with local regulations. It also empowers a team of experienced professionals to lead content creation and maintain the BBC’s high standards in India.
