Tag Archives: HT Media

With 25 letters in his name, the new Editor of ‘Mint’ gives an old warhorse some competition, but in vain

The business newspaper Mint has a new Editor: Sruthijith K.K.. The former Media Nama, Huff Post, Economic Times journalist replaces Vinay Kamat at the helm. The new Editor’s full Aadhaar-PAN Card-passport name appears in the paper’s imprintline today, just as Vinay’s did as Vaman Vassudev Kamat. At 25 letters, “Sruthijith Kurupichankandy” is arguably the longest…

‘A determined political operation has turned new media into a propaganda tool: not pluralistic and interactive, but relentlessly one-way and single-themed’

*** The weaponisation of Indian broadcast and digital media by Hindutva forces has been a key force-multiplier in coarsening the discourse and manufacturing consent, to be encashed at the ballot boxes. In this, the first of a two-part excerpt from his new book Freedom, Civility, Commerce, journalist and academic Sukumar Muralidharan argues that the eagerness…

Operation Rajnikant: starring Samir & Vineet Jain

There are 12 media personalities in the Indian Express list of the most powerful Indians in 2014—“ie 100″—for 2014, but 10 of them are proprietors, only one is a journalist and the other is a former journalist. As usual, the most interesting part of the prospective list are the factoids accompanying the profiles. # 19,…

Shekhar Gupta storms into India Today powerlist

Thirteen out of India Today magazine’s 2013 ranking of the 50 most powerful people in India have interests in the media, but only two of them (former Indian Express editor Arun Shourie, Times Now editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, Indian Express editor-in-chief Shekhar Gupta) are pure-play journalists. The chairman of the press council of India, Justice Markandey…

HT strips Vir Sanghvi of editorial advisory role

Have the Niira Radia tapes claimed their first journalistic victim? Last Sunday, columnist and anchor Vir Sanghvi announced that his weekly ‘Counterpoint’ point in the Hindustan Times would be taking a breather. Today, Archna Shukla of the Indian Express reports that his designation as “Advisory Editorial Director, HT Media” has been changed to “Advisor, HT…

Anything ToI does, the competition can do worse

Over the last two decades, The Times of India group has earned plenty of flak for its marketing and advertising gimmicks that have erased the difference between what constitutes editorial and what is supposed to be advertising. But what about its glorious competitors? On top is the front-page wraparound of Monday’s Hindustan Times, with a…

Not just about the brothers, it’s the children too

Far from being cowed down by N. Ram‘s threat to sue for the “demonstrable falsehoods and defamatory assertions” in its report on “Ram’s role and actions in developments within the newspaper group and the company“, the Indian Express continues its coverage of the goings-on in the board room of the “Mount Road Mahavishnu” for the…

Why did the editor cross Kasturba Gandhi Marg?

So, why did Raju Narisetti suddenly leave Mint, the business Berliner launched by the Hindustan Times group, in December 2008, less than two years after the newspaper’s launch, and return to the United States? *** # Was it because he was opposed to staff and salary cuts as proposed by the management, as insiders claimed?…

Pseudonymous author spells finis to Mint editor?

PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: Journalists at Mint, the business daily launched by the Hindustan Times group as “an unbiased and clear-minded chronicler of the Indian dream”, are in a state of shock after the dramatic weekend announcement of the resignation of its founding editor, Raju Narisetti (in picture), less than two years after…

How the Sakaal Times dream became a nightmare

PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: Nothing is bringing home the seriousness of the global economic downturn to Indian media practitioners better than the breakneck speed with which media plans are being revised or revoked. Just a few months ago, it all seemed hunky-dory—a 20 per cent growth for the media and entertainment industry in…