Hindustan Times had an ethical malfunction 15 years ago, when its then editor V.N. Narayanan was revealed to have plagiarised over a thousand words of his Sunday column from Bryan Appleyard‘s piece in the Sunday Times of London the previous week. (Narayanan was let go without a formal explanation from the paper as to why a new editor had taken charge.)
Now, The Times of India shines the light on an even wierder case of plagiarism involving HT.
Neha Maheshwari of Bombay Times wrote ‘More than friends’ on the supplement’s television page on December 9. Unbelievable as it may be, ToI says the same piece appeared with the same byline and the same text in the Hindustan Times city supplement HT Cafe on December 11.
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Karthik Srinivasan writes that HT has tendered an “apology”:
Image: courtesy Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd
Read the full article: Imitation is the best form of flattery
Also read: How should publications deal with plagiarists?
‘Plagiarists speed up spread of knowledge’
If imitation is the best form of flattery…
The award for the best opening paragraph goes to…
IJR 
This is bizarre!
Interestingly, HT has apologized today for this gaffe, in the front page of HT Cafe (Mumbai). http://twitpic.com/7sndk8
However, 2 questions remain.
1. I understand a mass press release finding itself verbatim in HT, but how did a TOI journalist’s name find its way into HT? Does that mean, HT copied, pasted it from TOI?
2. Is ‘screw-up’ an appropriate word for the front page of a general daily like HT Cafe?
If the piece was based on a ‘mass press handout’, can TOI demand that no other newspaper should pubish it?