As is only to be expected, a number of journalists figure in former Economic Times, Times of India and Financial Express journalist Sanjaya Baru‘s book ‘The Accidental Prime Minister‘ (Penguin), on his days as the PM’s media advisor.
But a few publishers and head honchos do too, including Prannoy Roy of NDTV, Samir Jain of The Times of India and his mother Indu Jain, and Shobhana Bhartia of Hindustan Times.
***
In May 2005, as the UPA approached its first anniversary, reports began to appear that the PM was reviewing the performance of his ministers.
On 9 May, when he was in Moscow, NDTV ran a story that external affairs minister Natwar Singh had secured a ‘low’ score on the PM’s ‘report card’ and was likely to be dropped from the Cabinet.
Natwar was most unhappy and took the day off on ‘health grounds’.
This news reached the PM in Moscow when he was in the midst of a briefing at his hotel. He asked me to find out what exactly NDTV had reported.
When I brief him he burst out angrily, ‘Tell Prannoy to stop reporting these lies.’
I called Prannoy Roy and had just begun speaking to him when the PM asked for my mobile phone and spoke to Prannoy himself, scolding him like he was chiding a student who had erred, saying, ‘This is not correct. You cannot report like this.’
Indeed, the relationship between him and Pranny was not that of a PM and senior media editor but more like that of a former boss and a one-time junior,. This was because Prannoy had worked as an economic adviser in the miistry of finance under Dr Singh.
After a few minutes, Prannoy called me back.
‘Are you still with him?’ he asked
I stepped out of the room and told him that I was now alone.
‘Boy, I have not been scolded like that since school! He sounded like a headmaster, not a prime minister,’ complained Prannoy.
***
Rupert Muroch (of Star TV and News Corp) tried a trick to secure an appointment (with the PM).
Having failed on one occasion to meet Dr Singh, he made a second attempt by letting it be known that he was not interested in talking about his media business. Rather, he wanted to talk about China.
The PM was amused and granted him an appointment. Murdoch did duscuss China and explained where he saw China going. But, as he got up to leave, he expressed the hope that the Indian government would be more receptive to his media plan than China had been.
***
Within the PMO, (former national security advisor) Mani Dixit’s imperious style inevitably came into conflict with my own more freewheeling and irreverent style of functioning.
Our first disagreement was on who could travel with the PM on his official plane.
Seeing the name of Times of India journalist Siddharth Varadarajan, who later served as editor of The Hindu, on the media list, Mani sent me a note informing me that Siddharth was not an Indian national but an American citizen and, as a foreign national, was not entitled to travel on the PM’s plane.
I was aware of Siddharth’s citizenship, since this matter had come up when I had hired him as an assistant editor of the Times of India.
I chose not to make an issue of it then and Samir Jain, vice chairman of Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd, the publishers of The Times of India, who took particular interest in the hiring of editorial writers, did not object either. Now the matter had surfaced again.
***
I arranged a series of breakfast meetings with important editors, publishers and TV anchors. As an early riser Dr Singh would schedule his breakfast meetings for half past eight being late to bed and late to rise, editors and TV anchors would protest but turn up on time.
When I invited a group of publishers, the only ones to arrive late were Shobhana Bhartia of Hindustan Times because, as she tole me, she took a long time to dry her hair and Indu Jain, chairperson of the Times of India, because she had to finish her morning puja.
Also read: Kuldip Nayar on Shekhar Gupta, N. Ram & Co
B.G. Verghese: a deep mind with a straight spine who stands tall
Vinod Mehta on Arun Shourie, Dileep Padgaonkar, et al
IJR 
Women always have good excuses to come late (:
Manmohan sighn became PM of India for two consecutive terms because of his allegiance to Sonia Gandhi and so did not command the kind of leadership needed to rein his own cabinet ministers who blatantly abused their respective portfolios. The corruption in the second inning of his term has seen unprecedented scale as never before. I would rather prefer Sonia her as PM, unfortunately Indian psyche is so overwhelmed with foreign issue that malice played more dominant role rather than nationalist from preventing her to become PM.
I don’t have any faith in BJP, the party which rest its foundation on communism. Narendra Modi and like would see Hinduism prevail in India and allow more massacre of other religious believers. Be it Muslims, Christian, Jain, Buddhist, or any other.
So instead of Indian progressing under his leadership, India may go the castrastopic way. So beware all Indians before you vote him or BJP.