Anchor's 'Do Kaudi Ke' Jibe Sets Off a Storm

Synopsis

The use of the word ‘do kaudi ke' to describe teachers on YouTube has sparked a wide debate among the masses after they were used by Aaj Tak Managing Editor Anjana Om Kashyap during a live discussion on May 29 – 30, 2026. Many prominent online teachers vehemently reacted against the show, Khan Sir, Abhinay Sharma among them, saying that it was “godi media.” As of June 3, there is no apology or explanation.

A Letter that travelled faster than the broadcast

It was the exact moment when Priya Yadav from Muzaffarpur saw the clip while she was a second year aspirant for SSC Combined Graduate Level examination, who was preparing for her second attempt of the same examination.

She said that she was watching a rebuttal video by Abhinay Sir at 11pm at night. He was cool, but I knew he was really hurt, these are the people that taught me everything I know, calling them worthless was personal.

Her response was one among millions of the repones which flooded social media platforms within 24 hours of the original airing of Aaj Tak.

Anjana Om Kashyap, Managing Editor and prime time anchor of Aaj Tak, a Hindi television network which is one of the most-watched news channels in India is the central figure in the controversy.

While the public fuming over the NEET-UG 2026 paper leak has been heating up on the evening of May 29-30, 2026, Kashyap turned her wrath towards India's exploding community of YouTube based teachers.

What Was Said: The Remarks in Context

Kashyap said in the broadcast that popular YouTube ‘star teachers’ are ‘explainers' building up their platforms as businesses. She said that many of them were lacking in "academic sophistication" but captivating millions of students with "attractive thumbnails, sensational language and misleading claims.

She called the teachers "do kaudi ke" (roughly meaning "not worth two pennies") and described the teachers as "sketching on blackboards not to teach but to 'grab views' and 'do drama' and get money from students.

Kashyap also said that the emergence of such teachers has led to a shift of focus from content learning to coaching culture.

The items were said with a high degree of assertiveness and the video was edited, posted, distributed and viewed by many, many people within hours of the programme's conclusion.

Teachers react: Godi Media Chants and Sharp Rebuttals

The reactions to the online education community were prompt and more synchronized in the Indian social media landscape than is typical. Abhinay Sharma, the founder of the popular Abhinay Maths channel, directly challenged the characterisation of Kashyap, emphasizing the significance of the role of YouTube educators for aspirants from smaller towns and rural areas to prepare for competitive exams like JEE, NEET, SSC, Railways, and UPSC.

In a casual phrase used in public discourse in India, Sharma and other teachers accused mainstream television journalists of engaging in 'godi journalism' — which refers to 'party journalism' or 'establishment journalism' — and wondered why the media was holding scrutiny on YouTube teachers, when the entire NEET paper leak — a systemic failure in the administration of government examinations — wasn't being discussed.

Faisal Khan — Khan Sir — added his voice pointedly. In a statement that was itself viral, he said that no one who was, simple, accessible to millions of rural or middle class students" should be described in disparaging terms.

In response, Suman Mam, teaching at ‘Ocean Gurukul’ said that many online teachers were providing education for free to those students, who were unable to join any coaching institutes, thus directly negating Kashyap's claims.

Students mobilise; Personal Testimonials flood social media

This dispute was different from the norm in the social media world in that the responses were not merely social media, but were of substance. Students, many from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Jharkhand.

where offline education is structurally not available, described the student in detail, with great specificity, of how he/she enabled a student to crack an exam, to understand a concept, or to continue studying despite financial difficulties.

It's said that within a single day, hundreds of comments and reactions to the video were posted, and millions of them were collected for public view, in contrast to anonymous trolling that public figures are able to shrug off, these were first-person anecdotes with real educational outcomes.

The NEET-UG 2026 paper leak, which triggered student protests in several states, set the tone for the reaction.

The Broader Debate: TV Credibility and the Education Economy

The issue is playing out at a time of significant tension between traditional TV news and the new digital TV content landscape.

The ministry of information and broadcasting ordered the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) in March, 2026, to stop publishing the TRP data of TV news ratings, alleging “unwarranted sensationalism” in the ratings. This was later extended to a suspension.

In the past few years, online education market in India has grown significantly. One of the biggest education brands to emerge from YouTube, PhysicsWallah made its public markets debut in 2025 with a valuation of around 5.2 billion US dollars, which Reuters pegged at fifty percent year-on-year revenue growth.

Kashyap's remarks allude to the size of the industry that had become public and owned by teachers.

Material is context for NEET-UG 2026. Several YouTube teachers had been some of the strongest critics of the errors in the administration of examinations and addressed students who trust them. People have been criticising Kashyap's remarks without official confirmation that this was not coincidental to that trend of institutional critique.

No Apology Issued, Silence from Aaj Tak

There was no public apology or clarification issued by Aaj Tak channel or Anjana Om Kashyap as of June 3, 2026, regarding the original broadcast comments.

The silence has been interpreted as either a sign of normal broadcast practice of letting controversy simmer and boil without official involvement, or as a sign that in this kind of controversy, so much personal and voluminous is at stake that the time of silence may be inappropriate.

Testimonial videos by teachers remain posted on YouTube and student posts on testimonials remain current as of the time of this writing. The hashtag that tracks the controversy keeps popping up in-between.

A Question That Outlasts the Clip

At the core of this dispute is a question that neither side has fully answered: what standards of accountability, if any, govern a media space — whether broadcast television or YouTube — that reaches millions of viewers who have nowhere else to turn for news or education?

India's regulatory frameworks for digital content remain works in progress. The debate that Anjana Om Kashyap ignited has — perhaps inadvertently — made that gap more visible than it has been in some time.