Thread by @npojha

*Mystery and Scandals*, from IWoI. Must have been the cover – 11 across more than half the issue. Also note lament about fleeting public memory. 30 years is quite the expectation, though.

This set, from 1987, starts with a scandal that surfaced in 1957…

cc
@PritishNandy

The Mundhra Affair. In which @kottary recounts c1957 of the then FM and Finance Secretary being held to account for helping an industrialist via LIC.

To me, what stands out even today is the speed, clarity, and integrity with which M C Chagla conducted the fact-finding.

2nd story is of Jayanti Dharma Teja.

Forgery & tax fraud, moves quickly to escaping to Cannes, NYC, Costa Rica, and Heathrow (arrested), featuring Lord Dingle Foot (his lawyer) and ‘spent 4years 7months in prison, where he wrote poetry and papers on physics’

by Anuradha Dutt

I’ve referenced this one earlier as well. For more on Jayanti Teja, do read this too, from India Today.

https://twitter.com/npojha/status/1120892471561474050?s=20

The most mind-bending story of this series. Nagarwala, by Onkar Singh and Vinod Behl.

SBI Parliament Street dispatches Rs. 60L on telephonic instruction, Delhi Police finds missing money in few hours, entire trial takes 10 minutes – Nagarwala convicted. Mystery unsolved.

The next one – personal connection – first assassination of a Union Minister. L N Mishra murder, Samastipur 1975. Boss Jha, Anand Margis, Yashpal Kapur, and cop-vs-cop. Case wasn’t settled in 1987, article says; well, the trial was still going on in 2003.

by Nikhil Lakshmanan

Ok, 11am meeting now. More when I get back to this in some time.

Also, Nikhil Lakshman (not Lakshmanan) for the previous story.

Rajan's custodial death. Importance of Habeas Corpus in the hands of an upright lower-court judge, and why no citizen should presume truth in Police’s version. Ever.
Later, how (not) to be a judge in a perjury case (ref: post-retirement)
cc @gautambhatia for this, by Venu Menon

Onkar Singh and Vinod Behl again. This time, quoting @Manekagandhibjp “the story is one of treason, lies, corruption and last but not the least, of adultery” and “facts so startling that they make the Watergate scandal pale in comparison”.

Hardly, but a sordid saga nonetheless.

Tortuous machinations in awarding a fertilizer plant to one MNC vs. another.
The Minister, instead of refuting charges: “This very fact – how did he get copies… requires a CBI probe.”
Truly, the only new things in this world are the history one doesn’t know.
by Padmini Sukumar

Ivan Fera writes of the truly bizarre Makalu sabotage case. Supposedly an attempt to assassinate Mrs. Gandhi. But as case facts showed, a fabrication that became more and more preposterous with time.

Oh What a Tangled Web We Weave...

Couple more in this series... Coming up soon after a short break.

"तुले अंतुले सब जय जगन्नाथ" was a line censored out "Aaj Ka MLA Ramavtar". Will take long to explain why.

But here, Aravind Vidyadharan summarizes the IGPP case, which was as big as it gets. A true high-water-mark for Indian journalism too.

And this series was rounded off by another of Arun Shourie's finds. Shika Trivedy recounted the Kuo Oil deal.

"You can ask the government about this. We got a directive asking us to accept the offer." An age when a PSU Chairman could speak bluntly.

Good note to end this thread on, from the closing lines of that last account:

"For no move was ever made to bring the guilty to book, nor was any guarantee given that such a mistake would never be committed again."

Sorry, should have been @gautambhatia88 on that one, not the one without 88.