One of those media houses was the highly commended BBC – lauded for its precise and unprejudiced reporting. However, even the best of us make ‘mistakes’ sometimes, including BBC.
Hang on @bbcnews Shashi Kapoor has died not Amitabh Bachan or Rishi Kapoor, who you've weirdly used to illustrate the story. pic.twitter.com/48jo6DGjU6
— Media Diversified 🇸🇩 🇵🇸 🇱🇧 🇸🇾 (@WritersofColour) December 4, 2017
During the coverage of Shashi's death, the channel made a massive blunder by airing footage of Amitabh Bachchan from Kabhi Kabhi instead of the Deewaar actor.
However, it didn’t stop there. To make matters worse, they followed Amitabh up with a clip of Shashi’s nephew Rishi Kapoor.
In actual fact, they failed to show Shashi's footage altogether and needless to say, people were not happy.
https://twitter.com/Maaiysa/status/937824594102276103
Individuals from around the world took to Twitter to call BBC out for its ignorance and insensitivity, and the necessary calls were made to make sure the channel knew exactly how insulting their error was.
https://twitter.com/martiburgess/status/937860249683398657
The British media giant was also criticised for executing the 'all brown people look the same' stereotype. Therefore, numerous people suggested that they take the necessary steps to promote diversity within BBC’s offices in order to prevent and avoid mistakes such as this in the future.
https://twitter.com/Lurganexile/status/937824763820544000
I'm really annoyed about the BBC Shashi Kapoor thing. DOES ANYONE GIVE A DAMN? If you do, please tweet the editor @paulroyall
— Aasmah Mir (@AasmahMir) December 4, 2017
Ultimately, news editor Paul Royall apologised for messing up.
#BBCNewsTen is very sorry wrong images were used to mark the death of Shashi Kapoor. Not our usual standards and I apologise for any upset.
— Paul Royall (@paulroyall) December 4, 2017
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