The pandemic and the economic slump may have given the Times group the cloud cover to pull the trigger on Mumbai Mirror, but the tabloid’s fate was probably decided when it was hived off from The Times of India’s parent company a couple of years ago seven months ago. Launched in 2005 with a Bennett…
Tag Archives: BCCL
When a journalist gets an honorary doctorate it’s news: ‘Mint’ ex-editor Raju Narisetti is now Dr Raju Narisetti thanks to the publishers of ‘The Economic Times’
Raju Narisetti, the Times School of Journalism alumnus who was founder-editor of the business newspaper Mint, has been conferred an honorary doctorate by Bennett University set up by The Times of India group. Narisetti, currently Publisher at McKinsey & Company’s Global Publishing, was conferred the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Honoris Causa) in Media Management…
“To do more for less is the new normal”: Times Group says #COVID crisis needs a “start-up mindset”, as it announces 5-10% salary cuts, defers variable pay and increments
Below is the full text of the note by Sivakumar Sundaram, chairman, executive committee, Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd (BCCL) *** Dear Colleagues, The last one month has been unprecedented in terms of the disruption it has caused in our personal and professional lives. I recognise it must be extremely stressful for all, worrying about…
‘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…
When salary isn’t commensurate with circulation
The latest issue of Caravan magazine has more than just the story of former Indian Express editor-in-chief, Shekhar Gupta. There is a fine profile of Eenadu bossman Ramoji Rao, and there are interesting numbers in a data analysis of the big newspapers by howindialives.com. One of the charts (above) in the latter story is how…
Arnab Goswami has done a fab job: Vineet Jain
Times group managing director Vineet Jain has been named person of the year by the industry journal Impact, from the exchange4media group. In an accompanying interview, Jain junior answers a couple of key questions. Talking to Ken Auletta of The New Yorker [last year], you said, “We are not in the newspaper business, we are…
An Editor explains ‘Arnab Goswami’ to an NRI
*** For most TV news consumers, Arnab Goswami is both a name and a phenomenon. But there are still large parts of the world to be conquered by Times Now‘s bulldog of an inquisitor. B.V. Rao, editor of Governance Now, explains the name and the phenomenon to a childhood friend who lives in Canada. ***…
How seven cartoonists drew one TOI cartoon
As part of its dodransbicentennial celebrations, The Times of India has published “a cavalcade of cartoons over 175 years”. Titled “Jest in Time“, it is put together by Ajit Ninan, Neelabh Banerjee and Jug Suraiya. At its launch in New Delhi on Monday, seven well-known cartoonists—Sudhir Tailang from Deccan Chronicle, Manjul from Daily News and…
Former TOI group vice-chairman no more
sans serif records the demise of Rustom Cowasjee Cooper, a former non-executive chairman of The Times of India group, in London on Tuesday, 18 June 2013. He was 91. Mr Cooper, an accountant by training, won the bank nationalisation case in 1971 and was a general secretary of the Swatantra Party, C. Rajagopalachari‘s party that…
Why Times Now doesn’t share TOI’s Aman ki Asha
On its edit page today, The Times of India has provided an extraordinary explication of the guiding philosophy behind the various newspapers, radio and TV stations that are part of the Times group: federalism. Authored by Kaushik Murali and Saubhik Chakrabarti, the 926-word piece says this federalism means Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd (BCCL) has…
The capital ‘I’ returns to The Times of India
The capital ‘I’ doesn’t appear on the pages of The Times of India, not on the edit page, not on the commentary page. That’s one way of keeping commentators from preening in the first-person. And that’s by order from the very top. But as the paper turns 175 and launches the ‘I Lead India‘ campaign…
So, how many journalists cracked CAT 2012?
Serving warm, uplifting news first thing in the morning is an integral part of The Times of India‘s sunny credo, a point which comes up over and over in presentations made its managers, and on the pages of the paper. Today, the paper serves it up by the bucketful with the story of N. Shiva…
New Yorker carries TOI response, 7 months later
Exactly seven months after The New Yorker carried a nine-page profile of Samir Jain, Vineet Jain and The Times of India by its acclaimed media critic Ken Auletta, the magazine has carried a response from TOI’s executive editor, Arindam Sen Gupta, in its May 5 issue, on medianet, private treaties and other subsidiary issues. Image: courtesy…
POLL: The biggest news story of last 175 years?
The Times of India, formerly known as The Bombay Times and Journal of Commerce, has kickstarted its 175th anniversary—its dodransbicentennial—celebrations. Under the rubric “Leading change for 175 years”, R.K. Laxman‘s iconic dhoti-clad Man from Matunga under goes a partial makeover, with one half wearing jeans and goggles. *** On its website, ToI has launched a…
ET’s advice to media: move on, let go
As a wave of earnestness sweeps across newsrooms over the Delhi gangrape, The Economic Times strikes a blow against the emerging political correctness: “The media, the general press especially, must recognise that neither public purpose nor journalistic remit is being served by what sometimes appears to be a predetermined decision to find a ‘Nirbhaya headline’.…
ʎlısɐǝ sıɥʇ pɐǝɹ plnoɔ noʎ ɟı ‘suoıʇɐlnʇɐɹƃuoɔ*
Since its sesquicentennial 25 years ago, under bossman Samir Jain’s helmsmanship, The Times of India has pioneered several editorial and marketing “initiatives”, all of which are scorned at first by the competition and then quietly copied. On the eve of its dodransbicentennial, after brother Vineet Jain told The New Yorker last year that he was…
How a martyr’s wife changed Arnab’s outlook
The bumper 318-page eighth anniversary issue of Impact, the media magazine from Anurag Batra‘s exchange4media group, features dozens of print, electronic, digital and radio professionals recounting their personal stories. Among them is the 2012 television editor of the year, Arnab Goswami, editor-in-chief of Times Now*: By ARNAB GOSWAMI In August 2007, Sanjay Dutt was being…
Will Britannia pay TOI for such ‘bad news’ in ads?*
Advertising innovations on the front pages of newspapers is a work in progress. Each morning turns up something new, something scarier, something educative—and we haven’t seen the end of the beginning. Yet. Today’s Times of India is one such morning. An “innovation” on the front page of the paper has gold biscuits floating happily all…
The Ambani brothers, TOI, Medianet & paid news
The “reverse-swing” done on Zee News by Jindal Steel is one of the most intriguing media stories in recent memory. The steel company says it is suing the Subhash Chandra-owned network for Rs 200 crore for the demand of Rs 100 crore in lieu of advertisements allegedly made by its editors, Sudhir Chaudhary and Sameer…
‘Every big story in last 3 years broken by TOI’
The front-page of the launch edition of Ei Samay, the new Bengali newspaper launched by The Times of India group, in Calcutta, on Mahalaya, the first day of Dasara 2012. The first day’s issue comprises a 32-page main broadsheet section, a 32-page supplement, and an 8-page tabloid section titled O Samay. The main section has…
IJR 