EMINENT JOURNALIST’S PROFILES (PAST AND PRESENT)

Rajdeep Sardesai

Mr. Rajdeep Sardesai, 43 years, is the Editor-in-Chief of the IBN Network, which includes CNN IBN, IBN7 and IBN Lokmat. A commonwealth scholar, He graduated with a master’s degree in law from the Oxford University. He has nearly 2 decades’ journalistic experience during which he has covered several key events in contemporary Indian and world history. He currently hosts key shows on CNN IBN such as ‘India at 9’ and ‘Weekend Edition with Rajdeep Sardesai’ besides special interviews with leading personalities.

Mr. Sardesai has been with ibn18 Broadcast Ltd. since its inception in 2005. As the Editor-in-Chief of the network, he is exclusively responsible for setting the channels’ editorial policy and overseeing the content of the channels. Prior to this, he was the Managing Editor of NDTV’s news channels NDTV 24 x 7 and NDTV India where he was responsible for overseeing the news policy for both the channels. He has also worked with The Times of India for over 5 years.

He has won numerous awards including the Best News Anchor Awards at both the Indian Television Academy Awards (2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008), and the IndianTelevision.com’s Indian Telly/ News Television Awards (2004, 2006, 2007, 2008). He has also won the Asian Television Award in 2003 and 2004, and received the prestigious Goenka journalist of the year award in 2007 and Impact mediaperson of the Year, 2006. In recognition for his contribution to the field of journalism, he was awarded one of the highest civilian honours in India, the Padma Shri, in 2008.

K.S. Sachidananda Murthy

K.S. Sachidananda Murthy is the Resident Editor of Malayala Manorama and The Week at New Delhi. He co ordinates the Delhi Edition of Malayala Manorama, as well as the National reporting for Malayala Manorama and The Week. He also coordinates the work of other publications of the Malayala Manorama Group, which has publications in five Indian languages.

"Sachi’ as he is known, began his career as a Reporter with the Indian Express, Bangalore from 1975 to 1982, covering politics, legislature, crime, metro affairs and developmental news. In 1982 he joined The Week as its correspondent in Bangalore covering the state of Karnataka.

He specialises in coverage of international and national affairs and regularly writes on Governance, International Relations and Diplomacy, Constitutional Matters, Parliamentary Affairs, National Security and Politics. He has travelled to several countries with the President and Prime Minister of India to cover their bilateral and multi lateral visits. He also covered the 1991 coup in Soviet Union which led to the disintegration of the Union and has covered the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka.

He writes a weekly column on National and International Affairs since 1990 for Malayala Manorama titled “New Delhi” and writes an anecdotal column on current affairs, “Last Word” in The Week magazine.

B. G. Verghese

B. G. Verghese has been with the Centre for Policy Research since 1986. He started his career in journalism with the Times of India and was later Editor of the Hindustan Times (1969-75) and Indian Express (1982-86). He was Information Adviser to the Prime Minister (1966-69), a Gandhi Peace Foundation Fellow for some years after the Emergency and Information Consultant to the Defence Minister for a short period during 2001. He was a recipient of the Magsaysay Award in 1975 and Assam's Sankaradeva Award for 2005. Verghese has served on a number of official and unofficial boards and committees and continues to be associated with a number of NGOs in the fields of media, education, the environment and community relations. He is chairman of the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, Delhi, and a distinguished fellow of the Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad.
Verghese was a member of the Kargil Review Committee and co-author of the Kargil Review Committee Report tabled in Parliament chronicling the sequence of events leading up to the India-Pakistan confrontation and recommendations for the future. He was also a member of the Editors Guild of India Fact Finding Mission to Gujarat in April 2002.
With a keen and enduring interest in developmental reporting and the social transformation it can help bring about, Verghese has authored several books including the seminal Design For Tomorrow early in his career following an extensive tour of the country and its infrastructure projects, Waters of Hope, Harnessing the Eastern Himalayan Rivers, Winning the Future, India’s Northeast Resurgent, and Reorienting India. His latest book, Rage, Reconciliation and Security (Penguin 2008) deals with managing India's diversities. Schooled at Doon School, Dehra Dun, India, Verghese went on to read Economics at St Stephen’s College, Delhi University and Trinity College, Cambridge. Verghese was born in 1927.

Cherukuri Ramoji Rao

Cherukuri Ramoji Rao better known as Ramoji Rao (born 16 November 1936), is an Indian businessman and media entrepreneur. He is head of the Ramoji Group which owns, among other things, the world's largest film production facility, Ramoji Film City. Rao cherukuri was born in Gudivada, Krishna District, Andhra Pradesh, into an agricultural family. The creation of Ramoji Film City is rooted in the Ramoji Group’s long and illustrious involvement with the film industry. Over the past two decades, Ushakiron Movies – the dedicated film production company of the group – has produced over 80 films in several Indian languages including Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Marathi and Bangla.
Eenadu - One of India’s largest circulated regional language dailies with a readership of over 90,00,000. ETV Network - A 12-channel source of rich infotainment, speaking to audiences in the language of their choice: Telugu, Bangla, Marathi, Kannada, Oriya, Gujarati, Urdu; and Hindi to viewers in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.
Every ETV Network channel focuses exclusively on its audience’s unique cultural identity, its aspirations and its distinct socio-political character. Ushakiron Movies - Feted for producing meaningful and absorbing films that appeal to audiences across the social spectrum. The 20-year-old company has produced nearly 80 films in Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Marathi and Bangla.

H K Dua

H K Dua currently Editor-in-Chief of The Tribune, is one of the senior-most journalists of the country, having served as editor for over 14 years in four leading national dailies. He has been the Editor of the Hindustan Times, Editor-in-Chief of the Indian Express and Editorial Advisor of The Times of India. Mr Dua’s journalistic career spans over four decades, his major areas of interest being political and international affairs. He has reported Parliament, political parties, two wars with Pakistan, several general elections etc.

He has also been commenting on national and international affairs in his column as well as on TV channels. Mr Dua has interviewed several distinguished world leaders. They include: Margaret Thatcher, China's Li Peng, Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Iran's Rafsanjani, among several others. He has served as Press Advisor to two Prime Ministers and an Ambassador of India to Denmark, prior to his taking up his present assignment with the Tribune.

Mr Dua has several prestigious awards to his credit, apart from the Padma Bhushan which the President K.R. Narayanan conferred on him in 1998 for distinguished service to journalism. He has received the Durga Rattan award for Excellence in Journalism, the Freedom of Information Award, the G.K. Reddy Award and the B.D. Goenka Award. He was awarded honorary degree of D.Lit. by Kurukshetra University last year.

K N Harikumar

K N Harikumar is a writer and current affairs commentator, with special focus on Karnataka, India and South Asia. Other special interests include constitutional law of India, media freedom issues and the impact of the Web on newspapers and other mass media and publishing in general.
Born into a family of newspaper proprietors, he was associated for about 25 years with the top editorial and management of Deccan Herald, Prajavani, Sudha and Mayura newspapers and magazines. In August 2001, he resigned from the positions of editor, managing director and Chairman of The Printers (Mysore) Private Limited, the company that publishes of the earlier-mentioned publications.
He has been associated with various media organisations like the Press Trust of India as director and Chairman, Press Institute of India-Research Institute for Newspaper Development as trustee and Chairman, Indian Newspaper Society, Karnataka Press Academy as Chairman, among others. He has participated in various seminars and conferences in India, Pakistan and the United States, on Indian politics, foreign policy, media, etc. Besides publishing various editorials, articles, etc. in newspapers, magazines and journals, he has written in and edited a book, Courts, Legislatures, Media Freedom, published by the National Book Trust, New Delhi.

Vinod Mehta

Vinod Mehta is the editor-in-chief of Outlook Group (Outlook, Outlook Hindi, Outlook Money, Outlook Traveller, Outlook Business, Outlook Profit, Outlook Lounge, Marie Claire (India), People). The group is owned by Mumbai-based Rajan Raheja. Mehta was born in Rawalpindi, in Pakistan. His family fled to India when he was three.
He attended La Martinere School and the university in Lucknow. He has published three books, including a biography of Sanjay Gandhi. He took over as editor-in-chief of Debonair in 1974. Since then, he has founded and edited numerous publications. He is the founder-editor of India's first Sunday paper, The Sunday Observer, the founder editor of the now defunct Bombay daily.
The Independent, and the founder-editor of The Pioneer (Delhi edition). He was also editor of The Indian Post. Mehta wrote and presented “Letters from India” for the BBC. His first book, Bombay: A Private View, an account of life in Bombay, was self-published. Mehta lives in New Delhi. He is married to Sumita Sen, a journalist who has worked for The Pioneer and the Sunday Times of India.

Ajit Bhattacharjea

Ajit Bhattacharjea began his journalistic career in 1946 as an apprentice sub-editor and reporter on the Hindustan Times. In 1948, he covered the Indo-Pakistan was in Kashmir. He joined The Statesmen, New Delhi, in 1951 and was appointed Special Representative and Parliamentary Correspondent. Ten years later, he returned to the Hindustan Times as its correspondent in Washington and the United Nation. He came back to Delhi as its Editor in 1967.
in 1971, he was appointed Resident Editor, Times of India, Bombay. In 1975, he left to edit Jayaprakash Narayan’s weekly, Everyman’s. when it was closed by the Emergency, he moved to the Indian Express as Editor. After he retired in 1983, he served as Editorial Adviser. The Democrat, Nigeria, and then of the Deccan Herald, Bangalore. He was appointed Director of the Press Institution of India in 1955 and retired in 2004
Ajit Bhattacharjee is Fellow of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla and currently Editor of Transparency Review, a journal of the Centre of Media Studies, New Delhi, which focuses on right of information. He has written several books, among them: Kashmir, the Wounded Valley; Jayaprakash Narayan, a Ploitical Biography, Countdown to Partition, Tragic Hero of Kashmir, Sheikh Abdullah; Dateline Bangladesh and Social Justice and the Constitution.began his journalistic career in 1946 as an apprentice sub-editor and reporter on the Hindustan Times. In 1948, he covered the Indo-Pakistan was in Kashmir. He joined The Statesmen, New Delhi, in 1951 and was appointed Special Representative and Parliamentary Correspondent. Ten years later, he returned to the Hindustan Times as its correspondent in Washington and the United Nation. He came back to Delhi as its Editor in 1967.
in 1971, he was appointed Resident Editor, Times of India, Bombay. In 1975, he left to edit Jayaprakash Narayan’s weekly, Everyman’s. when it was closed by the Emergency, he moved to the Indian Express as Editor. After he retired in 1983, he served as Editorial Adviser. The Democrat, Nigeria, and then of the Deccan Herald, Bangalore. He was appointed Director of the Press Institution of India in 1955 and retired in 2004
Ajit Bhattacharjee is Fellow of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla and currently Editor of Transparency Review, a journal of the Centre of Media Studies, New Delhi, which focuses on right of information. He has written several books, among them: Kashmir, the Wounded Valley; Jayaprakash Narayan, a Ploitical Biography, Countdown to Partition, Tragic Hero of Kashmir, Sheikh Abdullah; Dateline Bangladesh and Social Justice and the Constitution.

Mammen Mathew

Mammen Mathew is postgraduate in History from St. Stephens College, Delhi. A journalist with The Times of India during 1966. Later joined Malayala Manorama as Special Correspondent in New Delhi specialising in Parliamentary reporting. Joined Lord Thomson's Western Mail, Cardiff as a reporter and moved on to The Sunday Times, London. Joined the Oklahoma Publishing Company in the US in 1969, first as a reporter for the Oklahoma City Times and later for The Daily Oklahoman. After studying the operations of Ashahi Shimbun and Manichi Shimbun in Japan he returned to India and took over as the Resident Editor of Malayala Manorama at Calicut in 1970.
Became Editor and Managing Director of Malayala Manorama Co. Ltd in 1988. He was honoured by the President of India with the National decoration 'PADMA SHRI', on January 26, 2005, for his contributions to the cause of journalism. He was also bestowed with the Rajiv Gandhi National Award for Excellence in Journalism in 2005.
He is the Editor of Malayala Manorama Group of Newspapers with 42 publications of which 'Malayala Manorama' Daily is the largest circulated regional language newspaper in India. He is also the Chief Editor of The Week, the English language news magazine of the group. 'Manoramaonline', the online edition of the newspaper, is rated fourth on a global ranking and our TV Channel 'MANORAMA NEWS' is rated first among the State news channels.

Hari Jaisingh

Hari Jaisingh former Editor of The Tribune group of publications, has had a distinguished journalistic career spread over a period of 38 years. He has worked in senior positions with several leading Indian newspapers, including the Indian Express.A keen observer of Indian and global developments, Jaisingh was also a contributor to the Morning Telegraph and The Guardian, London. He occasionally participates in television programmes.
A strong advocate of the freedom of the Press and a value-based democratic system, he is totally committed to public causes and human rights of various sections of society, especially the poor, the downtrodden and the innocent. He has a reputation of being a crusader against socio-economic ills and corrupt practices. Widely travelled, Jaisingh has been associated with professional bodies such as, the Press Council of India, the Press Guild of India, the Namedia Foundation, the National Commission for Cooperation with Unesco. He is also on the Senate of various universities. He was President of Editors Guild of India (2002-2004).
Jaisingh is the author of India and the Non-aligned World; India between Dream and Reality; India after Indira: The Turbulent Years; Kashmir: A Tale of Shame; No, my Lord: a window on India’s realpolitik; (released by Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh recently) and A Song called Life (under print). He is presently working on a major book project: ‘Indian Upsurge: Where we stand and whither we go.’