Say what you will, Anushka Sharma is a woman of her word. In March 2019, the actor backed a web series based on disgraced Tehelka editor Tarun J. Tejpal’s book The Story of my Assassins despite the cloud of sexual harassment charges hovering over him. The Bombay tabloid Mid-Day reports today that the project is…
Tag Archives: Tehelka
Who tried to kill a senior journalist? Anushka Sharma will tell Tarun Tejpal’s novel of his would-be assassins, and Amazon will stream it.
With impeccable timing, on International Women’s Day 2019, Mumbai Mirror reports that former Tehelka editor Tarun J. Tejpal‘s 2010 novel The Story of my Assassins, is to be made into a web series by the actor and director Anushka Sharma. A true story, the novel tracks a senior journalist as he sets out to investigate…
18 factoids in ‘Caravan’ profile of Shekhar Gupta
The December “media issue” of Caravan magazine has a 20-page profile of former Indian Express editor-in-chief and shortlived India Today editor-in-chief Shekhar Gupta. Authored by Krishn Kaushik, the profile is titled “Capital Reporter”, with the strapline “How profit and principle shaped the journalism of Shekhar Gupta”. *** # The son of a minor bureaucrat from…
In new law mag, Sunanda Pushkar post-death pix
There’s a new magazine on your news stand: India Legal. The 84-page magazine, priced at Rs 100, and edited by former India Today executive editor Inderjit Badhwar is published out of Delhi. Writes Badhwar in the editorial of the launch issue: “The thrust of our magazine—as should be the endeavour of all competent news journalism—is…
In Ernakulam, this is Anita Pratap reporting for…
Former Tehelka, India Today and Headlines Today journalist Ashish Khetan is to be the Aam Aadmi Party’s candidate from the New Delhi constituency, continuing the fledgling party’s strange infatuation with journalists. But from deep south, there is news that AAP may field a blast from the past, Anita Pratap. The former Time, CNN, Indian Express,…
How new rape law caught up with Tarun J. Tejpal
Tehelka founder-editor Tarun J. Tejpal has been in jail for over 80 days now on the charge of “raping” a junior colleague during an event organised by the magazine at a Goa resort. The Goa police have charged him on seven counts under the new rape law that came into effect after the Delhi gangrape…
Jessica Lal, Tehelka, Bina Ramani & the media
It was in South Delhi socialite Bina Ramani‘s Tamarind Court restaurant that Jessica Lall, a “model who worked as a celebrity barmaid”, was shot dead in 1999 by Manu Sharma, the son of Congress politician Venod Sharma. Initially exonerated of the charges, the case turned full turtle for Sharma following a sting operation by Harinder…
Tarun Tejpal & the tale of the poor shepherd-boy
The elevator implosion of Tarun J. Tejpal and the plight of Tehelka as a result have been discussed ad nauseam after the first emails were leaked on 20 November. But the commentary, outrage and sympathy have come from the usual set of bold-face colleagues, rivals, friends, socialites, feminists and lawyers, among others. But how is…
Tarun Tejpal, Manish Tewari and relief at PBC
From Off the Record, the Monday gossip column in Deccan Herald: “Tehelka editor Tarun Tejpal‘s fall from grace has brought a sense of “divine justice” in Prasar Bharati, where the invisible presence of Tejpal—thanks to his closeness to the information and broadcasting minister Manish Tewari—was one of the contributing factors behind a long-standing “difference of…
‘The Hindu’ sets up anti-harassment panels
Following the Tarun J. Tejpal meltdown at Tehelka, media organisations are scrambling to put in place in-house mechanisms as mandated by law to deal with potentially similar incidents. As of today, 1 December 2013, The Hindu, which has a woman Editor at its helm in Malini Parthasarathy, has constituted internal complaints commissions in its offices…
Aroon Purie and Vinod Mehta on Tarun Tejpal
As former Tehelka editor Tarun J. Tejpal faces imminent arrest for the alleged sexual assault of a junior employee at a conclave organised by the magazine, two veteran editors—Aroon Purie of India Today and Vinod Mehta of Outlook*—write about the callow Chandigarh boy who branched out to become a brand. At India Today, Tejpal was…
Tarun Tejpal: Hubris and self-loathing in Goa
Tunku Varadarajan in the Daily Beast on l’affaire Tarun J. Tejpal: “What made Tarun Tejpal do this?” everyone asks. Some answers suggest themselves, the most unsettling of which is that, for all his rhetoric in the cause of women, Tejpal is, perhaps, just another unreconstructed, predatory Indian male who was playing the part of PC…
‘Tarun Tejpal was trapped in a skin not his own’
Former Outlook* publisher, Maheshwar Peri, who now runs Pathfinder Media, the magazine company which publishes Careers 360, on his friend and former colleague Tarun J. Tejpal**. *** By MAHESH PERI The stupidity of our nation gets greatly exposed with the extreme reactions to Tarun J. Tejpal—the cult following of his journalism at one end, and…
Online appeal to protect Tehelka journo’s privacy
The following is the full text of an online appeal to protect the privacy of the Tehelka journalist whose complaint against the magazine’s editor Tarun J. Tejpal resulted in his “offer” to recuse himself from office for six months. To all editors, journalists, bloggers, users of social media, and the public: Some websites and blogs…
POLL: Is sexual harassment rampant in media?
Shocking and disgraceful as it is, l’affaire Tarun J. Tejpal is sadly not the only incident of a sexual predator lurking around Indian newsrooms. Except that, in this case, a brave journalist—and her equally brave colleagues—broke the code of omerta and let the world know what was happening. But Delhi is not India, one magazine…
10 reasons why ‘The Hindu’ returned to its past
N. Ram, chairman of Kasturi & Sons Limited and the former editor of The Hindu, on why the “family” reverted to its past after a brief flirtation with “professionals”, in an interview with Shougat Dasgupta of Tehelka: “Editorialising in news reports, editorialising in the guise of news, which is strictly prohibited by the binding code…
Lift yourselves up, dearie, or get into my elevator
Tehelka editor Tarun J. Tejpal‘s 312-word letter to managing editor Shoma Chaudhury, expressing his “offer to step down” and not attend office for six months following a “bad lapse of judgement, an awful misreading of the situation” with a younger female colleague, has received plenty of negative acclaim for its sheer lack of contrition. Inspired…
Tarun Tejpal steps aside as ‘Tehelka’ editor
The following is the full text of the letter sent by Tarun J. Tejpal, founder-editor of Tehelka, to the managing editor of the magazine, Shoma Chaudhury, at 2.58 pm today. The subject line is: Atonement. My dear Shoma, The last few days have been most testing, and I squarely take the blame for this. A…
Dayanita Singh’s #1 tip for young photographers
The photographer Dayanita Singh in conversation with Shougat Dasgupta of Tehelka: What also may appear archaic to young photographers is your insistence on reading. You advise photographers to take a course in literature rather than photography… I don’t think there’s anything to go to photo school for. I could teach you how to make a…
The ex-journo who cast ‘Shah Rukh’ in a film
Former print and TV journalist Janaki Vishwanathan, whose first Hindi film Bakrapur has a goat named Shah Rukh, in an interview to Tehelka magazine: What draws you to your topics — child labour and devdasis? My training as a journalist made me pick on something that has a basis in reality. Also, I ceased to…
IJR 