A foreign correspondent is an exotic bird quickly going extinct. Once upon a time, newspapers had correspondents in many of the world’s news hotspots: Washington and London certainly but also Islamabad and Colombo, Dubai and Dhaka. Paris, Brussels, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, Johannesburg, Sao Paolo have all seen an Indian presence at one time or the…
Tag Archives: Rupert Murdoch
Indian media is in such fine fettle that the death of the great ‘Sunday Times’ editor Sir Harold Evans is just a routine affair
To no one’s surprise, the passing of Sir Harold Evans, the legendary Editor of The Times, London, received less-than-enthusiastic coverage in English newspapers in India, most of which were happy to run a dry Reuters or AP obituary on the foreign page. Only The Telegraph, Calcutta, in whose design in 1982 Sir Harry is rumoured…
J-POD || Podcast || “The stench of dead bodies did not go away from my mind for days” || Parul Sharma, the brave photographer who captured the last lap of hundreds of COVID victims with a smartphone
https://soundcloud.com/user-311470525/j-pod-the-woman-photographer Over 26,000 Indians have perished due to COVID in the last four months. But is there an image of any one of them that is imprinted in your mind? A single photograph in your newspaper or magazine that you remember instantly, for its poignancy, for its pathos—for its display? *** Whether they are natural…
Why Shobhana Bhartia was late for PM’s breakfast
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…
’50-60% China coverage in TOI, HT adversarial’
A six-month study of India-China coverage in the top-two English newspapers in New Delhi shows that between 50 and 60 per cent of the stories are of adversarial nature, “establishing a pattern of clear negative China coverage”. The Delhi editions of The Times of India and the Hindustan Times, both of which have correspondents based…
‘You furnish the pictures, I’ll furnish the war’
Modern journalists not used to the thrills and travails of sending despatches on the telegram and the teleprinter and the telex machine from the back of beyond will not understand the hoo dash ha in today’s papers on the decision of the Bharat sanchar nigam limited bracket open BSNL bracket close to wind up the…
What to do when a rival hijacks your story
How should a newspaper which has been pursuing a scandal for over a decade react when a rival journalist scoops a confessional interview with the personality at the centre of the story? Or looks likely to lob softball questions? If you are Rupert Murdoch, you advice the interloper. Oprah Winfrey‘s interview with cycling champ turned…
Rajya Sabha TV tears into Reliance-TV18 deal
The fears over what happens when a big business house with deep pockets and political influence across parties funds a big media house to legitimise its hitherto-hidden media interests, are coming true even before the controversial Reliance Industries -Network18/TV18-Eenadu Television deal can be inked. Obviously, the political class is silent. Obviously, TV18’s competitors won’t touch…
Why Indian media can’t laugh at Murdoch’s plight
SANJAY JHA writes from Bombay: Rupert Murdoch, the emperor of media leviathan News Corporation, shuttled on a transatlantic flight over a tumultuous week-end that saw a popular British Sunday tabloid bite the dust, never to rise again. News of the World (NOTW) was founded prior to the Great Indian Mutiny of 1857, but closed with…
The Guardian, Nick Davies and News of the World
PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from Delhi: Most journalists who succeed in bringing down a minister or a bureaucrat, or a government, wear it as a badge of honour. How about Nick Davies, who has brought down a 138-year-old newspaper, the News of the World—and its mighty owner Rupert Murdoch—with his searing expose of the phone hacking…
Thrice bitten, will FT find love after 20 years?
PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: For a newspaper that likes to think it is the handbook for global executives on how to run their businesses, Financial Times hasn’t quite had a textbook entry into India. Twenty years ago, when the doors of the economy were opened ajar and the rumours of the iconic British…
‘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…
Why is Rupert Murdoch taking on Samir Jain?
New Delhi’s media circles have agog all this week with news of a “sting” operation on The Times of India by The Sunday Times of London. The question: why would Rupert Murdoch‘s paper take on Samir Jain‘s, especially when it is not revealing anything particularly new? Is something afoot between the media giants? Has a…
Second editor of Indian origin for ‘Newsweek’
Tunku Varadarajan, the Indian-born, US-based writer-educator, has been named the new editor of Newsweek international, becoming the second journalist of Indian origin after Fareed Zakaria to hold the reins at the American magazine. Tunku broke the news through a tweet on Wednesday: “My news: Looks like I’ll be editing Newsweek International”. Born Patanjali Varadarajan, 48-year-old…
Star News chief made to ‘sweep’ Kashmir street
The renewed violence on the streets of Kashmir—against the presence of armed forces, the stifling of free movement and speech, the alienation of the State and the humiliation of the people—is not sparing journalists on the job, too. Samar Halarnkar of the Hindustan Times reports in today’s paper that… “A friend’s husband, the chief of…
A broadsheet battle as seen by a tabloid tycoon
An easy-to-understand animated film of the battle between Arthur Sulzberger‘s New York Times and Rupert Murdoch‘s Wall Street Journal, as interpreted by the Taiwanese tabloid tycoon, Jimmy Lai‘s company Next Media Animation. External reading: Tabloid sensation recreates the news
Rajeev Chandrasekhar eyeing ‘Kannada Prabha’?
PALINI R. SWAMY writes from Bangalore: Bangalore’s media circles are abuzz with rumours that Kannada Prabha, the struggling Kannada newspaper owned by the New Indian Express group, is being eyed by the Rajya Sabha member Rajeev Chandrasekhar, who also owns the 24×7 Kannada news channel Suvarna News. Obviously, there are no confirmations or denials of…
Wall Street Journal editor ‘denies’ minister’s SMS
M.J. Akbar‘s Sunday Guardian dishes out the garam masala of the day, outing the mischievous minister who allegedly sent allegedly inappropriate text messages to an editor of the Wall Street Journal after her recent interview with him. Last week, the Delhi tabloid Mail Today had mentioned the gossip in its columns, two days in a…
When editor makes way for editor, gracefully
The change of editorship at Indian publications is (usually) a graceless cloak-and-dagger affair, done in the dead of night after the janitors have left the building. Media consumers are rarely ever told why the helmsman has left or why a new one has come in, especially when there is a cloud shrouding the midnight operation.…
Is India right in barring foreign journalists?
The Great Wall between India and China is not made of bricks and mortar; it is made of freedom and liberty. Any debate, any discussion, anywhere, on the superpowers-to-be is sealed, signed and delivered by the roaring presence of those essential ingredients in plentiful on our soil, and the utter lack of it in our…
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