The media website The Hoot, created under the auspices of the Media Foundation and run by Sevanti Ninan, who writes a fortnightly media column in The Hindu, has this piece of media gossip today:
“Rumour mills in Delhi have it that Mint editor Raju Narisetti’s exit last month had something to do with the home minister’s displeasure over an anonymous letter from an IAS officer which Mint carried, and then re-carried. The Hoot ran into P. Chidambaram and asked him if it was true. His answer: “Who is the editor of Mint? I don’t know him. I have never met him and I did not know he had left.”
How would Mint, which set a high benchmark in media ethics under Narisetti’s stewardship, report the same incident which has conflict of interest oozing from every word?
“Rumour mills in New Delhi have it that Mint editor Raju Narisetti’s exit late last month had something to do with the Union home minister’s displeasure over an anonymous open letter to the prime minister from an IAS officer which Mint carried, and then re-carried in an open clarification. A Hoot correspondent ran into P. Chidambaram in the market/ at a party and asked him if it was true. His answer: “Who is the editor of Mint? I don’t know him. I have never met him and I did not know he had left.“ Hoot editor Sevanti Ninan is the spouse of T.N. Ninan, the editor of Business Standard, which competes with Mint in select markets. The couple own a minority stake in BS. T.N. Ninan started off as a sub-editor on the business desk in the Hindustan Times, which is owned by HT Media that also publishes Mint. Narisetti’s now-defunct blog, The Romantic Realist, referred to a BS column by its No.2 editor A.K. Bhattacharya, which markedly refused to name Mint while commenting on the original controversy involving Mint and the pseudonymous IAS officer ‘Athreya‘, in its penultimate post.”
IJR 