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Network18 Group

company

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 20, 2026
Entity authorityQ17078993
Source-derived summary

Network18 Media & Investments Limited (d/b/a Network18 Group) is an Indian media conglomerate owned by the Reliance Industries with 56.89% share headed by Mukesh Ambani and rest of 43.11% is equity holding. Rahul Joshi is the managing director, chief executive officer and group editor-in-chief, and Adil Zainulbhai is the chairman of its board of directors.

Incorporated in 1996 by Geeta and Rakesh Gupta, the company was acquired by Ritu Kapur and Raghav Bahl to be converted into a conglomerate holding company between 2003 and 2006. It oversaw one of the largest collections of media properties in India following its conversion but became encumbered with debt due to aggressive expansions. In 2012, the company entered into a debt agreement with Reliance Industries, through which it was granted a number of channels from the ETV Network. The agreement eventually enabled a hostile takeover of the company in 2014.

History

1996–2007: Acquisition and restructuring

SGA Finance and Management Services was incorporated on 16 February 1996, as a private limited company by Geeta and Rakesh Gupta and acquired soon afterwards by Vidya Devi and Anil Jindal. The company had remained inactive without any clear prospects until it was later acquired by the promoters of Television Eighteen India Limited.

The news broadcasting company Television Eighteen (TEIL) founded by Ritu Kapur and Raghav Bahl, became a public limited company in 1999 and its initial public offering (IPO) received an overwhelming response. The investments through the IPO exceeded the target set by the company by a magnitude of over 50 times by the end of the year, raising ₹2,511 crore (equivalent to ₹31 billion or US$320 million in 2023) in the process.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Network18 Group” as company. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Network18, Group and company.

Editorial reviewMost valuable as an event-and-institution map that identifies actors, dates and record creators for deeper historical inquiry. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1996, 2003, 2006, 2012—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1993. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Network18, Group and company providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Network18 Group”, the useful work is to connect “company” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q17078993. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1996, 2003, 2006 and 2012.

Critical limits

Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Network18 Group”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Network18 Group primary sources, Network18 Group archive and Network18 research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Network18 Group”?
  2. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
  3. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Network18 Group” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.