In Pakistan’s highly political media landscape, centrism / objectivity is an anomaly. There, most major broadcast networks are owned by influential families / business tycoons whose interests align either with the government or the establishment, hence the news coverage particularly of political matters and social issues is mostly colored by those affiliations.
In 2016, Talha Ahad decided to start his own news network aimed at disrupting this model. Built on the hypothesis that young Pakistanis look for unbiased information that is currently missing from the news landscape, his company, The Centrum Media (TCM), markets itself as Pakistan’s first Independent digital news network — one that provides a centrist perspective. “Deep down there was a hunch a contextual need is there to understand the news, especially for young audiences,” Talha said. Nonetheless, as a digital news organization producing unbiased content, The Centrum Media dealt with a lot of challenges to take root in a heavily censored media landscape that controlled narratives.
Over the past seven years, TCM, which began as a team of two people, has developed into a newsroom, video production company, and digital media consultancy firm with more than 40 employees along with a country-wide network of freelance journalists. The company’s office – run from a house in Islamabad (an unconventional setup) – has the feeling of an unpretentious hybrid newsroom, with young team members collaborating over the tops of computer screens.
TCM’s journalism is recognizable by its well-researched content, snappy quality video editing, explanatory style, and exclusive original series featuring prominent Pakistani figures, such as Journalist Diaries featuring the stories of Pakistani news breakers. The organization doesn’t shy away from sensitive social topics, giving a platform to everyone from transgender activists (Naked Truth) to drone attack survivors in Pakistan. As an organization that started with a single Facebook page, TCM’s journey has been extraordinary where the TCM News Social Platforms currently receives more than 20+ million views a month. A total of 7000 videos have been uploaded attaining 1 billion + views across a span of 7 years.
Growing up in Pakistan in the shadow of the 9/11 attacks, Talha became consumed with news and geopolitics from an early age. An avid reader, he closely followed the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq at a time when most of his classmates were more interested in trading Pokémon cards. When he moved to the UK to study journalism for his bachelor’s degree, Talha was the first (sometimes to a fault, he admits) to start debates about international affairs – even with his teachers.
Dissatisfied by the old-school style of his journalism classes, he closely studied the work of emerging news outlets like AJ+, Vice News, and NowThis covering the digital information explosion around the Arab Spring. At the same time, he started engaging with student groups from both right and left along with journalism organizations in London. “I started realizing that rather than only considering the extreme ends of a spectrum,” Talha said. “We need to explore the middle ground more.”
Observing the Pakistani news media landscape and how it runs like a real estate business, Talha soon realized that this centrist approach is hard to find in Pakistan, and there he found a market gap. According to the organization Reporters Without Borders, Pakistan is ranked 145 out of 180 in the 2020 Press Freedom Index. News organizations frequently use selective censorship, leaving out information news consumers need to understand the full story. Pakistan’s media regulators are known to block programs airing interviews which feature opposition leaders or controversial figures.
Despite Talha’s pessimism about journalism prospects in Pakistan, he felt the pull of his home country following graduation in 2015. After producing a few freelance pieces for international media – including one video story for NowThis (Pakistan’s First female truck driver) that went viral – Talha started to see a gap in digital coverage that legacy media outlets weren’t filling. The mainstream media in Pakistan was obsessed with breaking the news first policy, without providing any context or in-depth knowledge to the masses. As a journalist, Talha began to think that if he started his own news platform, he could bring in nuanced reporting and especially contextual journalism which the masses were hungry for. Soon after TCM was born.
Talha and a fellow journalist Wahid Ali began producing video content to publish on Facebook; The stories quickly gained traction online. “I was looking at the audience’s behavior, reading their comments. I was also closely observing what the local Pakistani media was posting on digital media, this helped me identify the gaps in the market in addition to the type of content the audience in Pakistan would gravitate towards.” Talha said. “The numbers were telling us that the people are watching and were hungry for more of such content.”
TCM’s platform evolved with a focus on stories that would appeal to the masses with a special focus on the younger demographic. For this, Talha followed his interests. “As a millennial, I wanted to know both sides of a story before tilting towards a side. I am sure that everyone else would also want the same for themselves” he said. With a shoestring budget consisting of his savings from the UK, Talha slowly started expanding his team to build a one-stop shop for communication services, branding, media, and communication consultancies, along with in-house high-quality video production and video distribution services.
Still, making the business profitable took some strategy. “I was working all day and then when I was going home, I was figuring out okay how to make money now,” Talha said. Living in Pakistan’s capital, he started to get short-term contracts from both corporate and development sector clients – founding a second branch of the company, Centrum Communications, in 2018. “We tried to diversify the whole business model,” Talha said.
Since its founding, TCM developed a reputation for its video-only content and interview access to some of Pakistan’s biggest names. Although his company found its niche through social media, Talha’s personal accounts are modest. “Deliberately, I was behind the scenes,” Talha said about building the TCM brand. “I did not want the story to be about me.” He made his first on-screen appearance for the brand in May 2022 during an exclusive podcast interview with former Prime Minister, Imran Khan. Later during the coverage of 2024 General Elections in Pakistan, Talha did an exclusive podcast series with all the top leadership of all major political parties on digital media for the first time. The unconventional interviews helped the audience to see beyond the big names and what actually happens behind closed doors of power corridors.
Seven years after founding his business, Talha is now focused on the long term sustainability of his brand. As part of ICFJ’s Elevate Program, TCM’s founder said he now has a chance to learn from the veterans and international mentors from the field, something he didn’t have when he started. “It’s all a bootstrap,” Talha said. “I was not an entrepreneur, but I think somehow deep down there was this person hidden in me that started coming out,” Talha said. Part of being ICFJ’s program is visualizing the strategic thinking for the future on paper, helping materialize thoughts that were previously only in his head.
As TCM focuses on sustainability, Talha said he is also working to share the knowledge that he has learned since starting his company. One of his ventures, TCM Academy, aims to teach the next generation of Pakistani journalists these skills. “I feel like there’s a huge gap,” Talha said when it comes to digital journalism training in Pakistan. “The market is changing and a lot of mainstream journalists need help to make a successful transition to digital but there is no guidance to provide them with the right skills suited to this day and age. Talha believes empowering the next generation is the only way to bring contextual journalism to mainstream.
Talha Ahad recently launched his own podcast, a project that is separate from TCM’s other original content. Over the past seven years, Talha had the extraordinary chance of meeting a diverse range of people. From the former Prime Minister of Pakistan (Imran Khan) to the prisoners released from Guantanamo Bay. The stories that he heard off-screen were far more meaningful than what reached the audiences onscreen. “I am going on a journey to explore who people really are beyond the face they show to the world. And have meaningful conversations about how their stories have shaped them and the way they see the world today,” Talha said.
Although he has gotten numerous offers from other major business groups’ and channels to sell TCM, Talha said remaining independent is key to remaining centrist. In this divided and polarized society, he sees this as an obligation. “For me, this is not just a business,” Talha said. It is my responsibility to bring out content in front of the masses which will help them challenge their preconceived notions and make informed decisions.”