India’s Tehelka magazine ‘nearing its demise’

Casualties are mounting at Tehelka magazine as, one after the other, editors are resigning. And as things stand today, observers say: “Tehelka’s demise was overdue.”

Given the iconic status it attained, largely because of its founder editor Tarun Tejpal, the publication had to fall prey, the moment the man behind it lost credibility. Sadly it happened, they say, not because he ceased to be a good journalist, but for the fact that he ceased to stay put on the pedestal we placed him!

So what’s Tehelka’s fate now?

Anadish Pal, scientist

“Tehelka could now only be resurrected by the will of some political masters, as no businessman is going to touch it after Tejpal sinks, for sink it surely will. Tejpal is not facing political cases of sedition for having delved into classified secrets; this time, it’s his personal misconduct, something to which he has already confessed to.

Tarun was a sophisticate and had a certain stature. But then, from Charlie Chaplin to Roman Polanski, there are misdeeds the famous perform, which dent their reputation and creativity. Even masters of the craft are not immune from calumny. Not to forget, even Van Gogh was driven to suicide partly under stress of his repeatedly troubling brush with streetwalkers and bordello women.

Tejpal has, all along his career, shown panache and talent, but not genius. He was rated high on innovation and push, which went to his head. He surely didn’t need Robert De Niro to embellish his Goa Thinkfest. In fact, Tejpal was a bigger icon, only if he had conviction in his capabilities (rather than ego). He lacked the raptness of a real great.

Tehelka was indeed a window, which tried to break new, untrodden ground. But it lacked political philosophy. It was fashionable and avant garde, but never moved beyond it. This holier-than-thou approach (of Tejpal and Tehelka), while scrutinising public life and society, could be the fate of any upcoming politician or a journalist, because moral posturing by either smacks of a kind of smug arrogance, which mostly stems from philosophical immaturity.

Tejpal knew he was vulnerable, but lately got into a sense of security with his new-found commercial success as a brand. It entirely was his personal lapse; call it his male menopause or his desperation as a failing Casanova. He must have been playing such games with women throughout his life, but then, he was not that powerful to be able to suppress his wrong doings.”

Jaishree Misra, author

“A successful brand isn’t necessarily inextricably tied to a person but, in the case of Tehelka, this is probably not true. Tehelka and Tarun Tejpal are so tightly enmeshed that, despite the high quality of journalists the magazine employs, the brand is likely to slowly sink and disappear without the man.

I recall feeling a sense of thrill when they did their exposé on the Bharatiya Janata Party and army kickbacks but, having trained in the UK as a journalist and having worked in the British Broadcasting Corporation, where a very strict code of professional conduct exists, I must say I was discomfited by some of the sting methods employed. There would have been many questions asked, had they been operating somewhere like the UK, but here in India, they became heroes.

I think India has many very good investigative journalists employed by different publications, so I didn’t see Tehelka as doing anything extraordinary. Certainly, Tejpal would have made enemies in the course of his work and, yes, there is definitely an air of Schadenfreude in the air, people seeming to enjoy the fall of a seemingly unassailable icon. But, if the allegations are true, then Tejpal deserves the punishment for being a predatory boss.”

Binoo John, senior journalist (excerpts from his blog on binoojohn.wordpress.com)

“He (Tejpal) is a case of life imitating his own fiction. He has become one of the characters he created and so he foresaw his own destiny.

The decline of Tejpal as a human being coincided with the decline of Tehelka into a slightly shady venture …. He and his sister stopped at nothing to get money out of corporates. Tehelka plummeted the depths just as it had climbed the heights of glory and made us all proud ….

No man in India achieved all that Tejpal did. He took on governments with a panache only he could summon, he wrote the best Indian fiction, though the establishment and readers ignored it, he created the best Indian magazine and now it’s gone. He wrote the best essays in the history of modern Indian journalism and if you read all of them, you will be astonished as to how a man embraced all what he hated and criticised ….

When I see him on TV being taken away, one part of me will die. For many others, there will be reason for gloating because he stamped on them and destroyed them. For the many women colleagues and friends I know he tried his tricks with, it will be justice ….

I am utterly broken. I knew early this year that his end was near. If you hit a bank once, you don’t stop with that. You always want a second hit. It is the same with assaults and one-night stands….

….as he climbed step after step, he lost interest in journalistic work. His mind was elsewhere. Like all great men, he lived in the future, but like all fallen men, he could not see his own life and character being chipped away at by the flesh-eating bacilli of ambition, greed and ruthlessness.

— Nilima Pathak is a journalist based in New Delhi.