Nirmala Lakshman: I didn’t step down, I resigned

This is the full text of Nirmala Lakshman‘s July 20 letter to the board of directors of Kasturi & Sons, the holding company of The Hindu, on why she can no longer continue as the joint editor of the paper, following the elevation of Delhi bureau chief Siddharth Varadarajan as the next editor of the paper.

Unlike her cousin N. Ravi and her sister Malini Parthasarathy, who have consistently opposed the decisions of N. Ram & Co, Nirmala went along with last year’s”demotion” of N. Murali, which entailed the controversial appointment of her son Narayan Lakshman as the paper’s Washington D.C. correspondent.

The nearly identical tone of the resignation letters of Ravi, Malini and Nirmala give the indication that it is part of a strategy as the company law board prepares to hear The Hindu on a daily basis, as directed by the Supreme Court. They are also, in a sense, a hint that it will not be all smooth sailing for the professionals.

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Dear colleagues,

It is with a deep sense of disappointment and sadness that I write this letter. The present board of directors has used a tenuous majority to force me out of my position as joint editor of The Hindu.  With the appointment of Siddharth Varadarajan as editor it has become untenable for me to continue as joint editor of The Hindu.

I would like to state for the record that I strongly protest this manner of trying to reorganize the company; with little foresight, complete insensitivity, and a lack of grace and decency. Opportunistic factionalism has taken precedence over concern for the institution’s welfare and progress as demonstrated in recent months.

Under the guise of professionalizing, experienced and professionally trained family members who have worked conscientiously and tirelessly for this institution for decades have been jettisoned to serve the self interest, the misguided perceptions and the personal agenda of a few.

With competitors making alarming inroads into our territory, functioning in this cavalier manner and playing the numbers game does not bode well for the future of The Hindu.

I would like to also reiterate that I am not “stepping down” as per the majority propelled board diktat but resigning of my own accord as joint editor. I will however continue as whole time director of the company.

Please take this letter on record.

Nirmala Lakshman

Also read: Why N.Ravi quit Hindu after 20 years as editor

Malini Parthasarathy quits as Hindu exec editor

Malini Parthasarathy: Why I quit Hindu as executive editor

The four great wars of N. Ram on Hindu soil

Why N. Ravi quit as Hindu’s editor after 20 years

This is the full text of N. Ravi‘s July 20 letter to the board of directors of Kasturi & Sons, the holding company of The Hindu, on why he can no longer continue as the editor of the paper, following the elevation of Delhi bureau chief Siddharth Varadarajan as the next editor of the paper.

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Dear colleagues

I write this letter with a deep sense of distress over the unsavoury happenings in the company that we and generations before us have nurtured with great care and dedication.

You are all aware that I have been working in a professional capacity in The Hindu since 1972.  The period when I was in charge as Editor between 1991 and 2003 saw the unprecedented expansion in the reach and coverage of The Hindu, and its transformation into a truly national newspaper that engaged in a lively and interesting way with the issues of the day.

The Hindu was then occupying the second position among the English language newspapers in terms of circulation.  The primacy of the editorial side was firmly established, fair coverage and diversity of opinions were ensured and the newspaper stood up to the pressures from governments as well.

It was also a period when people went about their work with total commitment and dedication with little inclination for boardroom politicking.  A fair degree of harmony was established among family members in 2000 which, however, lasted only until 2003.

Recent events have shown that deceit, lack of probity and bad faith have come into the dealings among family members on the board with a clique being formed through exchange of unmerited favours.

The turn of events since September 2009, and particularly since February 2010, have been marked by reneging on commitments made and agreements reached, benefiting from favours but not honouring reciprocal obligations and the vindictive removal of responsibilities from some and handing them to inexperienced and unsuitable family members to humour them and shore up support for a clique.

After having sworn by tradition and continuity for so long, to suddenly seek to remove highly qualified shareholder family members from the posts they have been holding for decades reeks of vindictiveness and the pursuit of colourable personal agendas.

A combination of megalomania and a crass disregard of the values that The Hindu has always stood for has brought the institution to this sorry state. It is shocking that some of the board members should want to run a media institution like a company producing plastic buckets with purely commercial considerations and unethical practices overwhelming editorial interests and values, thereby damaging the credibility of the newspaper.

The whole exercise of removal from posts on the editorial side is sought to be carried out in the guise of professionalisation as if the family shareholders holding positions on the editorial side are not in themselves qualified professionals.

Also, any claim of professionalisation is a sham as the separation of ownership from management is being applied selectively to some shareholders even as some other shareholders including wholly unqualified persons are being allowed to continue in high positions.

Ironically, the board clique that now speaks of professionalisation has been resisting suggestions to frame norms for the selection of family members to different posts and has been continuing to distribute responsibilities as largesses arbitrarily and without regard to qualifications.

The same arbitrary, non-professional procedure was followed even in the case of the appointment of Siddharth Varadarajan: his name was announced for the first time at a board meeting and passed without any discussion in a few minutes.

There were no selection procedures or prior consultation or evaluation of candidates that are normally followed in any well run company. In other words, the start of the so called professionalisation process has itself been carried out in a wholly arbitrary, non-professional way.

You are all aware that the board clique that removed the responsibilities of N. Murali was indicted by the Company Law Board in CP 25 of 2010 as lacking in probity and good faith. The same lack of probity and good faith is on display now in dealing with the reorganization of the editorial side and the actions of the board clique have been challenged in a company petition.

While the SLP before the Supreme Court stands disposed of without a stay but with directions for expedited hearing, the company petition is still pending before the CLB.

In the circumstances, the unseemly hurry in pushing through the appointment of Siddharth Varadarajan as Editor has made my continuance as Editor untenable. I hereby resign as Editor of The Hindu to which post I was designated in 1991.  However, I will continue as a wholetime director.

Sincerely,

N. Ravi

Also read: Malini Parthasarathy quits as Hindu exec editor

Malini Parthasarathy: Why I quit Hindu as executive editor

The four great wars of N. Ram on Hindu soil

 

 

Malini Parthasarathy: Why I quit ‘The Hindu’

This is the full text of Malini Parthasarathy‘s July 20 letter to the board of directors of Kasturi & Sons, the holding company of The Hindu, on why she can no longer continue as executive editor of the paper, following the elevation of Delhi bureau chief Siddharth Varadarajan as the next editor of the paper.

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Dear Colleagues,

I am writing this letter with a strong sense of hurt and anguish.

I have served this newspaper for the last 28 years with great earnestness, faith and a real sense of commitment in various capacities, starting as a staff reporter in Madras, and despite tremendous resistance from vested interests in the establishment, strong family and gender prejudice, have managed to make a substantive contribution to this newspaper’s glorious editorial heritage and reputation.

I was proud, as a granddaughter of Kasturi Srinivasan, a great Editor of The Hindu, to have risen through the editorial ranks and established a strong presence in the public arena even as I worked tirelessly to help build on the Hindu’s primary strengths—its editorial integrity and its commitment to journalism in its real sense, telling the news story as it really unfolds, without fear or favour.

In 2003, the strong family jealousies and prejudice intervened to pull away all my editorial responsibilities reflecting in an extremely personal and vindictive hate campaign, tarnishing my reputation, making me out to be “extra-constitutional” a “usurper” despite my more than two decades of editorial service, my academic qualifications and ground experience and despite the fact that I was an editorial functionary appointed by the Board of Directors.

Battling this tremendously debilitating hate campaign spearheaded by the present editor-in-chief, N. Ram and a cabal which tried every trick in the book to discredit my work for The Hindu, caricaturing me, making stinging references to my past personal difficulties, I still tried to make a contribution these last eight years to the editorial structure.

I spent all my evenings in the newsroom, tried to make constructive interventions only to be overruled and ridiculed in public. Although the daily humiliations were unbearable, I endured all this with the faith in this Board, that ultimately fairness and justice would prevail.

I did believe that this Board believed in equality of opportunity and it would recognise the work I had done for The Hindu but this was clearly not to be.

In bringing in Siddharth Varadarajan, an outsider with no familiarity with the Hindu’s rich editorial inheritance and no particular institutional loyalty, in the guise of “professionalising and contemporising”, what is sought to be done is to eliminate qualified successors from the family.

I deeply regret that my legitimate professional aspirations, especially as I had no hidden personal agenda nor any other stake in The Hindu were so belittled and so rudely rebuffed.

I am also deeply worried for the future of the newspaper given the scheme that is being contemplated by a group of directors who want to reduce the role of the Editor to another functionary in the company, sitting along with business side executives, treating the editorial operations as another branch of the corporate banyan tree.

By no  means is this contemporising or professionalising editorial operations. This is only legitimizing the incursions of personal agendas into editorial operations. While being market-friendly is certainly necessary, succumbing to a range of dangerous personal agendas including gross self-promotion is not in the interest of this great newspaper.

I am resigning from the post of executive editor since my continuance has become untenable with the Board seeking to humiliate me by putting a junior professional like Siddharth Varadarajan over me as editor.

I, however, remain a wholetime director of the company.

Sincerely

Malini Parthasarathy

Also read: Malini Parthasarathy quits as Hindu executive editor

The four great wars of N. Ram on Hindu soil

Kuldip Nayar: N. Ram stalling Malini Parthasarathy‘s ascent