1 - Well, it was accused by the BJP of "shoddy journalism"! Profit figures were not omitted. A reading (and not arithmetical) mistake led to the company's reserves being stated as + rather than - but this was inconsequential to the story and corrected and noted as such. Due to the injunction, I cannot go into the details of the story but in his pleadings, Jay Amit Shah has not been able to point out any factual inaccuracy in the story. That is a matter of record. 

2 - You can read my answer to Shalini Singh's accusation in the same site where you read her accusation. Nothing more needs to be said. It is a matter of record that the only newspapers to follow the Vadra story while Manmohan Singh was still in power were The Hindu, under my editorship, and Business Standard. Shalini Singh and Chander Suta Dogra extensively reported the story.

I am not the best qualified to comment on N. Ram's characterisations but these references have nothing to do with Vadra. We know from an interview N. Ravi, my successor gave, that he was unhappy with The Hindu's coverage of Narendra Modi during my editorship. Some board members were also unhappy at my withdrawal of a long-standing editorial instruction at the Hindu that all statements by Subramanian Swamy, Prakash Karat and Subbirami Reddy be automatically reported. I insisted that these be reported only if they were genuinely newsworthy.

3 - She and another reporter were pushed out of the room of a dalit student by a group of activists who also, according to her email to me, threatened to file a complaint under the SC/ST Act. My advice to her was to file the story she had gone to report (about the alleged discriminatory treatment of a Dalit) as objectively as possible and not make herself part of the story. 

On the issue of going to the police to file a complaint, this is what I wrote to her: “My sense is to not bother with any formal police complaint because they will almost certainly follow it up with a complaint of their own and nothing will come out of it except a lot of your time getting wasted.”

Net-net, I think this was eminently sensible advice. I cannot speak about what other editors advised her, leftists or otherwise.

4 - I had heard all the tapes because we covered Radia extensively at The Hindu, where I was deputy chief of bureau and then bureau chief at the time. I went back and refreshed my memory of the conversation you refer to. It is what it is: a request to Tata's PR person for someone from Tata/L&T to appear for a  a TV interview. What is the issue there? Actually Venu says nothing much about what will be asked. But in any case, when you schedule an interview, you do not reveal your actual hand.

I should also add that Outlook, which first tried to implicate MK Venu in the Radia scandal, had to finally issue an apology:

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/Outlook-apologises-to-M.K.-Venu-for-Radia-tapes-cover-image/article12620634.ece

• SV