Newscaster fired for calling Chinese president Eleven Jinping

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      Some in the media are still getting used to the Chinese president's first name.

      Xi Jinping is a little more challenging for English speakers than the name of his predecessor, Hu Jintao.

      But perhaps the worst version came when an Indian newscaster with the state-owned broadcaster Doordarshan referred to China's political kingpin as Eleven Jinping.

      It resulted from mistaking Xi for the Roman numeral for 11. (In China, surnames appear first.)

      The anchor, Nidhi Mehra, was sacked, according to the newslaundry.com site.

      What's worse is the blunder came while Xi was visiting India.

      The firing has received a mixed reaction among Indian newscasters.

      Former Doordarshan broadcaster Shammi Narang said somebody needed to "bear the brunt of the mistake", according to newslaundry.com.

      However, NDTV anchor Rini Simon suggested that it was "unreasonable to assume that just because the name's been in the news, everyone's supposed to get the pronunciation correct".

      Comments

      7 Comments

      nutsnbolts

      Sep 21, 2014 at 5:08am

      Xi/XI means eleven in roman numerals and in Canadian English that is exactly what it says 'Eleven'. This is Canada not China.

      AC

      Sep 21, 2014 at 8:48am

      Try Xi Li.

      Craigie

      Sep 21, 2014 at 9:51am

      Hey, Nuts,
      Can you read simple English?
      The story clearly says the newscaster was INDIAN, worked for INDIA's national broadcaster and was fired in INDIA.
      Also, is your post a parody of dimwitted racists, or are you the real thing?

      I only comment to call out bigots and idiots

      Sep 21, 2014 at 11:31am

      @nutsnbolts - actually it was in India. The world is a much bigger place than you appear to comprehend. Also most Canadians prefer to use Hindu-Arabic or Indo-Arabic numerals, so eleven = 11.

      Grant

      Sep 21, 2014 at 1:55pm

      That's funny. Hardly a firing offense. I have heard some newscasters mispronounce names in Canada but fire them? No, that is way over the top.

      James Blatchford

      Sep 21, 2014 at 4:08pm

      I wonder what ISIS would do? IISS....ops!