Aditya Sinha, editor-in-chief of DNA, in his weekly column:
“There was a telephone call from my father, who lives abroad, a few days ago. He wanted to know if it was true that the Army had planned to attack Delhi back in January, as reported in The Indian Express. Don’t worry, I said, no such thing. If the Army Chief had planned a coup to ensure he spent another year in office, then he wouldn’t have filed a petition on his date of birth in the Supreme Court.
“When we rang off, it seemed that there must be many ordinary Indians far and near who were scared by this story. What a shame. And the author tried to camouflage the cynical timing of the story (immediately after the government’s ugly spat with the Army Chief) by saying the story took 11 weeks to materialise.
“That would be credible if the story was loaded with data or fieldwork, like a story on child malnutrition in Maharashtra, for instance; it wasn’t. Even an RTI application gets answered in less time (though no RTI request would have generated such a cock-and-bull story).
“At the end of the day, a well-regarded journalist (he reported on the Nellie massacre in Assam nearly 30 years ago) was used by a cynical government. Guess who emerged from this looking diminished….”
“Too many editors in India (mostly the post-superannuation lot) who would never dare publish irreverence because they believe themselves to be part of the ruling class, and that it is their job to steer the country…. [Here] the editor not only values his friendship with the powerful over his devotion to his profession, but never hesitates to make himself the centre of the story.
“Compare men of letters (like Kingsley Amis and Edmund Wilson) with those in India who today have no ideology other than the service of power. Instead of the watchdog of democracy they would rather be the lapdog of crony capitalism.”
Also read: Indian Express ‘C’ report: scoop, rehash or spin?
Indian Express stands by its ‘C’ report
How the media viewed the Indian Express ‘C’ report
Aditya Sinha on the world-view of Delhi journalists
Read the full article: When the watchdog turns lapdog
IJR 
Likely, there was some goof-up somewhere, and there can be no smoke without a spark. Let’s give the benefit of doubt. Looks like a kind of a rare, long awaited windfall for a daily that once was respected for its aggressive anti-government, pro-people stands. Yes, the “lapdog of crony capitalism” is in kind of a slumber. With politicians and the bureaucracy looting the country right and left, and the governments being the silent onlooker, what the media might require is a Second Coming of Arun Shourie; not the likes of the ones who keep carrying the baggage of what they lapped up “30 years ago.”
AGREE IN TOTO , WITH PREM!