Monika Halan, editor of Mint Money, the personal finance section of the business newspaper Mint, is one of two Indians who have been selected by Yale University for its has ‘signature global leadership development initiative’. The official announcement from Yale reads: Monika Halan (India) Editor, Mint Money Halan is editor of India’s second-largest business newspaper,…
Monthly Archives: April 2011
The WikiLeak cable on the journalist who…
M.D. Nalapat, former resident of The Times of India in Bangalore and Delhi, in the Pakistan Observer: “While some NGOs are run by sincere individuals interested not in personal but in social gain, many of the organisations active in India act as milch cows for those controlling them. “For example, a top journalist got formed…
What Niira Radia told PAC on Barkha Dutt chat
The 21-member public accounts committee (PAC), which probed the 2G spectrum allocation scam and finalised its draft report in a hurry, has gone into a tailspin with the draft report being rejected 11-10 and the Congress members charging the chairman, Murli Manohar Joshi, of leaking the report. Tehelka magazine has put up the PAC draft…
Scribe says tribe crossed line in Niira Radia tapes
Several print and television journalists found their voices on the Niira Radia tapes. Some expressed remorse at such a cosy relationship with the lobbyist; some like you-know-who brazened it out. Now, The Hindu reports that one senior unnamed scribe who was caught on tape lobbying has candidly admitted that what they did was “utterly unprofessional”.…
YSR gets a much-needed “off” on Sakshi TV
KEERTHI PRATIPATI writes from Hyderabad: Ever since he died in a helicopter crash in September 2009, the smiling visage of Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy has been a permanent logo on the screen of Sakshi TV, the 24×7 Telugu news channel launched by his son, Y. Jaganmohan Reddy. It took the funeral of…
Indian Express, NDTV & the “scoop” that wasn’t
*** PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: There has been a brief hiatus to the “crude and disgusting character assassination” of the father-son lawyer-pair of Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan, after the Union government made it clear the insinuations would not sway the composition or functioning of the committee to draft the Lokpal bill. Now,…
When a film star weds a journalist, it’s news—II
Indian film stars—like politicians, businessmen, cricketers and others—rarely have anything nice to say about journalists and journalism, except when they have something to sell. Some, like Amitabh Bachchan and Ram Gopal Verma, have built a cottage industry biting the hand that feeds them to the masses. How nice therefore to find an inhabitant of tinsel…
‘Hindu Business Line’ to get a non-family editor
SHARANYA KANVILKAR writes from Bombay: Less than a week after the board of directors of The Hindu “decided” to appoint a professional from outside the family as the editor of the 132-year-old newspaper, the group’s business daily, The Hindu Business Line, is also slated to go the same way. The paper’s joint editor, K. Venugopal—son…
It isn’t easy to tell tales of even dead Editors
Outlook* editor-in-chief Vinod Mehta, in the letters’ pages of the weekly newsmagazine: Clarification In my Delhi Diary (Mar 21), I made some references to the late R.K. Karanjia, former editor of Blitz and one of India’s most respected journalists, and Col Gaddafi. I withdraw those remarks unreservedly and apologise to Russy’s family for any unintended…
The four great wars of N. Ram on ‘Hindu’ soil
ARVIND SWAMINATHAN writes from Madras: As if to prove the old adage that blood is thicker than water, there have been four rounds of internecine strife in the last 22 years in the undivided Hindu family that owns and runs India’s “most respected” newspaper. To no one’s surprise, Narasimhan Ram aka N. Ram, the card-carrying…
The Hindu adopts a ‘Code of Editorial Values’
Amid all the internecine strife over who in the family will (or won’t) get to occupy the editorial gaddi, the 12-member board of directors of The Hindu have managed to adopt a code of editorial values, although Mail Today reports that the new nine-point code has not been unanimously adopted by the board. *** 1.…
Swami Agnivesh has a question for Barkha Dutt
A champagne moment of live television, 39 minutes and 48 seconds into NDTV’s Buck Stops Here show on Wednesday, April 20, the year of the lord 2011. Star-anchor Barkha Dutt goes on and on about whether Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan should continue to stay as civil society representatives on the Lokpal drafting committee given…
Is Indian Express now a pro-establishment paper?
PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: The Indian Express of Ramnath Goenka is an unputdownable chapter in the book of Indian journalism. Unlike many of its English counterparts—whose grammar was constricted by Wren & Martin, and the Raj—Express was the archetypal desi bully. “Anti-establishment,” was the Express‘ calling card. Its reputation was built on stones…
Times School of Journalism’s 4-month internship
Anti-corruption campaigner’s error of judgement
An item in Raisina Tattle, the gossip colum in the Delhi tabloid, Mail Today. Image: courtesy Mail Today Also read: Bangalore journos named in site allotment scam Only in India: 90% off for journalists! Cash transfer scheme is already here for journalists Media houses are sitting on plots leased at one rupee!
‘Media doesn’t need a regulatory mechanism’
Prabhu Chawla, editorial director of The New Indian Express, in his “Ask Prabhu” column on the website of the South-based paper. Vol I. No. V. *** What is the real motive in having “Ask Prabhu” forum in NIE? I am following your Q/A season from very beginning but sorry to say that 90% of questions…
Financial World arrives without the usual bluster
The Financial World, the business daily from the Tehelka stable, has made a quiet appearance on the stands, just three months after it seemed all but over for the newspaper promoted by the controversial entrepreneur and parliamentarian, K.D. Singh. The 16-page, two-edition broadsheet hit the stands in New Delhi and Singh’s hometown, Chandigarh, on Monday,…
‘Media standards not keeping pace with growth’
Sanjaya Baru, editor of Business Standard and former media advisor to prime minister Manmohan Singh, delivered the second H.Y. Sharada Prasad memorial lecture on media, business and government at the India International Centre on Sunday, 17 April. This is the full text of his address: *** By SANJAYA BARU I first met H.Y. Sharada Prasad…
Tehelka promoter’s woes just don’t seem to end
K.D. Singh, the controversial promoter behind Tehelka magazine and its shelved Financial World newspaper project, is once again in the news—for the wrong reasons. Already under a shadow after allegedly buying his way into Parliament last June, and after being stopped at Delhi airport with Rs 57 lakh cash last month, India Today magazine reports…
When Samir served a thali, Vineet served a scoop
SHARANYA KANVILKAR writes from Bombay: As it approaches its dosquicentennial, India’s biggest English language newspaper, The Times of India, truly deserved a meticulous biography to tell the world on “what goes on inside this amazing media machine”. Sadly, Bachi Karkaria‘s Behind the Times (Times Books, 325 pages) is not that. Poorly structured, poorly sourced and…
IJR 