Government-owned public broadcaster Doordarshan sparked a row when it presented a new look for the DD News logo on Apr 16. The video attached with the announcement on social media platform X revealed the new logo, now in saffron instead of its distinctive red.

The new colour-scheme, however, did not go well with the Opposition. Trinamool Congress (TMC) Rajya Sabha member and Prasar Bharti’s former CEO Jawhar Sircar objected to the “saffronisation of Doordarshan’s logo- just before the elections!”

He also wrote that this will influence the voters by overlaying the “colour of one religion and Sangh Parivar colour (sic) with a neutral Public Broadcaster and a biassed Govt/Regime!”

Congress leader Manish Tiwari also had the same issue with the new branding, calling it an attempt to own the government entities and weaken the unbiasedness and trust of India’s public broadcaster.

Vishnu Vardhan Reddy, the deputy speaker of Andhra Pradesh, however, defended the move by saying that in 1959 when Doordarshan was launched, it had the saffron logo to begin with. 

“Now, as the government reintroduces the original logo, liberals and #Congress are outraging over it,” he added.

Gaurav Dwivedi, CEO of Prasar Bharti, said that the change was implemented keeping in mind the aesthetics and attractiveness of the logo. We have upgraded the look of Doordarshan as a whole, and, unfortunately, people are discussing such things about it.