http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/19/world/asia/pakistan-bol-tv-axact.html 2016-10-18 23:01:24 Stalled by Scandal, Pakistani Network Goes on the Air at Last The news network, Bol TV, made its first broadcast more than a year after its parent company, Axact, was embroiled in a scandal involving fake online degrees. === ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A high-profile Pakistani news network, Bol TV, made its inaugural broadcast on Tuesday, more than a year after its planned debut was derailed when its parent company was embroiled in a scandal involving fake online degrees. Bol TV Network’s parent company, the software company Axact, was caught up in criminal investigations after This month, the chief executive, Shoaib Ahmed Shaikh, was released on bail after he and more than a dozen others were indicted on charges of selling fake degrees and other counts. Separately, in August, Mr. Shaikh was indicted in a different case related to money laundering. Despite his legal woes, Mr. Shaikh vowed to proceed with plans for Bol to make its debut, and he has said he intends to start a related newspaper early next year. Meanwhile, After a lull of 17 months, the once-deserted headquarters of Bol TV Network, in Korangi, a suburb of the port city of Karachi, is now abuzz with activity. In the months before the Axact scandal left hundreds of Bol’s employees out of work, the network made headlines by wooing away top broadcasters and executives from rivals and offering pay far above the usual industry rates. The network’s management said that Bol would revolutionize the Pakistani local news media industry and offer an aggressively patriotic point of view. On Tuesday, Ali, a media worker associated with Bol TV who asked to be identified by only his first name, said that workers had started coming back over the past month and a half, and were again being paid. Members of the journalists’ trade union in Karachi have maintained that the initial closing of Bol TV was a major setback for media workers in Shoaib Ahmed, who led a campaign against broadcasting limits on Bol TV in the city, said, “From journalists to cameramen, and technical and managerial staff, the announcement of Bol’s shutdown was a thunder strike.”