The Mineral Water Tragedy

And other mysteries revealed by Aniv Investigation

Last summer, when twelve-year-old Margarita bought a bottle of mineral water she couldn’t even imagine she would lose her eyesight as a result. The glass bottle exploded and damaged her eye when she put the bag of groceries down to catch her breath on her way to the apartment where she lived. Her family tried to file a lawsuit against the mineral water company and get reimbursement in order to regain Margarita’s eyesight but failed…

This is just one of the stories investigated by Internews Armenia radio production group and broadcast in the framework of the new project Aniv Radio Investigation at Yerevan-based Ardzagank and Public Radio stations, as well as at Shant in Gyumri and Interkap in Vanadzor. The program on the mineral water tragedy was on the air this week, evoking lots of feedback from listeners in three cities. As told by Robert Balayan, a radio producer from Interkap, Vanadzor: “We had lots of phone calls from our audience. They insisted that the problems of our city should be covered as well.”

Aniv Investigation is a two-part program with an average running time of 30 minutes. As stated by the Internews Armenia production manager Harutyun Mansuryan, “While we produced Aniv Talk Show and Aniv Radio Hour, we constantly came across striking and impressive facts that we couldn’t explore to the end because the program format didn’t allow us. We realized we had enough materials to investigate, to launch a new program and to grab listeners’ attention. Plus, we already had the television investigative program and we thought: why not make a radio show?”