Opinion – Ankush Vats
From Sharda to Narada scam , the man has spent over 65 lakhs on a sting but didn’t have enough money to pay his employees on time.
I have been wanting to write this since a long time but didn’t have the courage to do it. I think the time was ripe to expose the man who took the ‘risk and pain’ to expose all the corrupt people in our country.
Yesterday, a sting came out in the media exposing the corrupt leaders of Trinamool Congress. If what is shown in the sting is true, the guilty should be punished. But I, personally, have serious doubts over the credibility of the man, Mathew Samuels, behind the sting. Of all the parties and states in India, why did he zero in on West Bengal ruled by TMC. Interestingly, Tehelka is owned by KD Singh, who is also a TMC MP in Rajya Sabha. Did he help Mathew in fixing his meeting with top leaders of TMC? The sting was conducted during Mathew’s tenure at Tehelka, did he use Tehelka’s resources to conduct this sting? I believe yes, he did.
I have worked with Mathew Samuel in Tehelka. During my last one year at Tehelka, there have been various instances where he has compromised the ‘editorial freedom’ that he so openly boasts off. Around a month before the Bihar assembly Polls, he announced in the editorial meeting that they have done a sting on some big leaders of the state. Later, in every successive meetings he would say that they have got the footage and release it soon. However, till date those ‘big leaders’ have not been exposed. He stopped talking about that sting during the editorial meetings as well. Why did he not release it even after claiming before everyone that they have got the footage? I leave it to the judgement of the readers.
In another instance, a colleague of mine had gone to Jharkhand to do a story on land scam worth thousands of crores in which a senior political leader was involved. The colleague filed the story and it was discussed to be a potential cover for the next edition. But Mathew stalled it for one month saying he was collecting some more documents on it. Later, he scrapped the story altogether without giving any reasons for it. When our bureau chief questioned it, he was asked to leave Tehelka. Why was the story not published when it had all the contents of being a cover story?
In a similar case with me, he asked me to do a story on rubber plantation happening illegally around Maharashtra-Goa border. I asked him for some contacts for the story he said he had none. Even then I went to Maharashtra-Goa border areas, talked to locals and filed the story. He stalled the story for two weeks, again saying that he is collecting some ‘documents’. The story was later carried because I had not targeted any particular individual or a company which was involved in rubber plantation there. There were many companies which were doing it so I couldn’t pin point a particular company.
I wonder what documents did he collect when he didn’t even have a single contact to give me to go ahead with the story. There have been many instances like this in Tehelka.
The manner in which he left Tehelka was also very suspicious. He announced that he was going to leave the magazine and start a new website (Narada News) with KD Singh. Tehelka is struggling to pay salaries to its employees. The only link we had with the management was Mathew. So when he announced his decision to leave, everyone was wondering what would happen to their salaries.
Hence, he fooled everyone one in the office by saying that the new venture will be a sister concern for Tehelka and it’s profits will be diverted to the magazine. Sadly, some people in the office believed him too. At that time also, I told my colleagues that why would KD Singh invest in a new news venture when a established brand like Tehelka was not profitable for him. Now, on his website he claims that the project was shelved three years back.
Mathew also exploited Tehelka resources for Narada. People in the Web team of Tehelka were asked to write stories for Narada. They would do it thinking that it was a joint venture between him and KD Singh.
There were two or three ‘trusted lieutenants’ of Mathew in the office. They would come to office with him, leave with him. Everyone in the office would ask about their job responsibilities but no one had any answer. They were drawing salary from Tehelka, and much more than some journalist there. The only job they did honestly was to arrange for food and alcohol during the office parties.
In his introductory note for Narada, Mathew has written that he left Tehelka when he was convinced that it was in the hands of ‘young and vibrant’ leadership. Little does he know that the magazine was turned from weekly to fortnightly and then recently to a monthly. He systematically weakened Tehelka by firing three of the best journalists I know, who would work for countless hours at stretch, even when we were not paid for it. Currently, Tehelka is on the verge of shutting down, I feel sad to say this but this is the harsh reality.
We have not been paid salaries for January and February. The salary for December we got in mid January. When the employees are asking when the salaries would come, the management has threatened to fire half of them saying the magazine is over staffed. When they told them that they were willing to leave if their salaries are cleared, the management played one of its cheapest tricks. It is harassing employees by saying that they owe money to the company for the trips that they went to.
Some of us had gone for outstation trips for work purpose, for which we would get some advance. After the trip we would file our bills with one of the trusted lieutenants of Mathew and get our reimbursements (if it exceeded) after two three months. However, now the management is saying that they have not received any bills and cut the amount from our salaries, which has been pending since two months. I was told that I owe Tehelka Rs 17,000, another colleague of mine owes over Rs 40,000.
There are times when there is no money with Tehelka employees to even travel to office. Because most of us are young and don’t have enough savings to survive on. Some of us have resigned and left Delhi because it was very difficult to make ends meet here. While there are some who are still struggling at Tehelka, hoping their dues will be cleared and they will be paid.
Mathew also offered jobs to most of us, including me, in his new venture, that too at a higher salary. We are all looking for a job, desperately. But not even a single person has accepted Mathew’s offer. Such is the trust and respect he has earned with his colleagues at Tehelka. We are all struggling to make ends meet but don’t want to be cheated again, that’s what we all feel.
On a lighter note: How Narada News Facebook page got over 3 lakh likes within hours of its launch?
Narada news was launched just yesterday. But it’s Facebook page has over 3 lakh followers. I was surprised to see it. I thought the sting has worked for Narada. While it is very likely for a Facebook page to get 3 lakh likes in hours. However it is close to impossible to get around 2400 people to review the page. When I went through the reviews of the page I found that the page already existed with some other name. They have changed the name of an existing group which had 3 lakh followers to Narada News. All previous posts of the page has been deleted.
Courtesy – Author’s Facebook Timeline.
The author is an employee with Tehelka and views expressed here are his own
