A new email that will form part of an ongoing public interest litigation has been assessed by Newslaundry. The email being referred to suggests another attempt at media management by Essar. The PIL is being moved by Centre For Public Interest Litigation through activist and lawyer Prashant Bhushan.

When Newslaundry contacted Bhushan’s office to confirm the development, Bhushan’s associate Pranav Sachdeva, said, “We confirm we are in possession of this email and will be filing it as part of the ongoing PIL in the coming weeks.”

The email exchange is purportedly between Essar executives, talking about a paid news complaint filed against Tehelka with the Press Council of India.

“We are trying to lay our hands on the complaint…”

On February 27, 2012 at 6:41 pm, Essar Steel India Limited Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs Manish Kedia writes a mail with the subject “Press council complaint”.

In the mail Kedia writes: “…from our media friends we understand that somebody has filed a complaint with the Press Council of India against Tehelka alleging financial relations between Essar and its [the magazine’s] editorial content.”

The email elaborates [all sic]: “The complaint alleges that two articles carried by Tehelka in the recent past, one on Soni Suri regarding the Naxal issue in Chhattisgarh, and another on attorney general’s one sided opinion are paid articles. Also, a complaint has been filed between the relationship of govt of Goa and Tehelka.”

For those not in the know, in November, 2011, Tehelka held its first “ThinkFest”. The Essar Group was the fest’s principal sponsor.

Kedia in the email goes on to state that they are trying to get hold of the complaint and the name of the person who filed it: “We are trying to lay our hands on the complaint and also figure out the name of the complainant.” For this purpose, Kedia says they will seek the help of one Ashish and that a Camary car should be arranged to pick him up from GK-II.

The mail states: “We will take the help of Ashish in this matter. Nancy will coordinate pick up point in GK-II, kindly arrange camry car for him.” 

On the same day, February 27, 2012, at 22:09, in less than five hours, Kedia sends another mail with the full text of the complaint that was registered with the Press Council of India. The complaint is addressed to the Chairman (who at the time was Justice [Retired] Markandey Katju) and urges the council to take action against Tehelka for breach of journalistic ethics. The complaint alleges that Tehelka published “stories providing ground-less vindication to big corporations like Essar and Loop in matters of grave public interests such as 2G and the Naxal crisis which in view of the huge sponsorship provided by Essar to Tehelka for its event could easily be termed ‘Paid news’”.

Here, it is pertinent to mention another leaked Essar email. Dated January 6, 2012, the email mentions a list of stories that were “coordinated” by the group with various media organisations in December 2011. Among others, the list contained a story by Tehelka. The only full-fledged story on the Essar group done by Tehelka during the period was headlined “The Madness in the CBI’s Method” and was authored by Ashish Khetan, who’s now vice chairman of the Delhi Dialogue Commission in Delhi’s Aam Aadmi Party government and enjoys Cabinet-rank status.

The complaint filed with the Press Council of India mentions the same story, “The Madness in the CBI’s Method”, and claims it was irresponsible and “smacks of forced or maybe even paid lack of objectivity”.

Newslaundry reached out to the Press Council of India to ascertain whether the complaint exists in its records. According to officials in the complaints section, the council does maintain a record of all the complaints filed, even the ones that have been dismissed. However, the complaints’ department failed to trace the original complaint in its records. An Under Secretary with the Council informed us that its records show that the complainant did not pursue the matter “by not complying with procedural requirements”.

“The matter was closed and reported to the Council,” the under secretary added.

Newslaundry has filed an application with the complaint’s department of the Press Council requesting it to trace the original complaint in its records. We will update the story as and when we receive a response.

Newslaundry also contacted the complainant, Shrinjan Khosla, a Supreme Court advocate. Khosla confirmed that she had indeed filed a complaint against Tehelka and even received a response from the council. “They wrote back asking for more details even though I had provided them with all the necessary annexure and information. I did not pursue the matter further,” she says.

Khosla had filed the complaint in her capacity as an intern with Supreme Court advocate Pranav Sachdeva, who also confirmed having sent the complaint to the Press Council of India. “I had helped her draft the complaint, and we had sent it only to the Press Council of India by courier around February 13, 2012. How did Essar manage to get it?”

Since the complaint mentioned the story by Ashish Khetan, we contacted him to figure if the Press Council had pursued any inquiry or asked him any questions following the compliant. According to Khetan, he had no idea about the complaint referred to in the email.

Here’s what he had to say:

” This is an utter lie. Have never spoken to Essar to help them in any kind of complaint whatsoever nor have ever sat in any car or transport that belongs to Essar. I have said it in the past and I will say it again that if anyone can produce an iota of evidence of my conflict of interest with regard to my work as a journalist or I having received any kind of pecuniary benefit from anyone who had been a subject of my journalistic work I would quit public life. I would strongly urge to investigate the authenticity of and the motive behind such emails in the larger public interest. I hope you work would move beyond innuendos.

I don’t have nor did I ever have a copy of the complaint. The copy of the complaint was never sent to me by the complainant nor the press council. I don’t know the name the whereabouts or the details of the complainant. The press council never wrote to me or sought my reply. Just because someone makes a complaint do I become guilty? And I repeat that if anyone can prove that I even offered to take a ride in any Essar transport or ever offered to help Essar in any kind of complaint against it I would quit public life. It has taken me 15 years of fearless journalism to build my reputation. I have taken on some of the most diabolical forces, the forces of hate & violence as a journalist. I have even staked my life in the line of my duty as a journalist. My family has sacrificed and chosen to live a life of austerity because of my commitment to public cause. I would not allow the army of cheap mud slingers to tarnish my reputation. Either someone produces the evidence of I being a beneficiary of any kind of benefit gained by illegal or immoral means or those who are behind this slanderous campaign should be exposed.”

We also contacted Shoma Chaudhury, the then Managing Editor of Tehelka, who said she “was not aware of any complaint against Tehelka with the Press Council of India”.

When we asked Essar executive Manish Kedia how he got hold of the complaint, since the only legitimate recipient of the complaint was the Press Council, he sent us the following response:

Your query below relates to a particular email which according to you was exchanged between two employees of the Essar Group. The email according to you is dated February, 2012. This email is now almost more than 3 years old and therefore we will have to check our internal records before confirming whether any such email was exchanged and what was the contents of that email. However, what is shocking is that you are claiming to be in possession of an internal email which may have reached you pursuant to a data theft. Admittedly this email according to you is a communication between our employees and therefore remains the property of the Company.

Irrespective of how Essar managed to get the copy and who helped them, it is disturbing that a complaint on paid news found its way to the very corporation that is part of the complaint, before any formal probe was initiated into the matter. Add to that the fact that Press Council of India, so far, has not been able to locate the complaint.

We have mailed Katju to ask him if such a complaint had ever been brought to his notice but have not received a response yet. Since the complainant did not pursue the matter, it is possible that senior authorities were not made aware of it. We also asked the current Chairman, Justice CK Prasad, whether Essar getting possession of the complaint before an enquiry was initiated amounts to any illegality since the Press Council of India is a quasi-judicial body. The story will be updated as and when we receive a response.

The story has been updated with Khetan’s complete quote to Newslaundry.

(Additional reporting by Arunabh Saikia)