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The Caravan

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The Caravan
Caravan Magazine Cover
February 2024 issue of The Caravan
Editor
  • Paresh Nath (editor-in-chief)
  • Anant Nath (editor)
  • Vinod K. Jose (executive editor; 2009–2023)
  • Hartosh Singh Bal (executive editor from 2023)
CategoriesPolitics, culture
FrequencyMonthly
Circulation40,000 (2010)[1]
PublisherParesh Nath
FounderVishwa Nath
Founded1940
CompanyDelhi Press
CountryIndia
Based inDelhi
LanguageEnglish
Websitecaravanmagazine.in Edit this at Wikidata
ISSN0008-6150

The Caravan is an Indian English-language, long-form narrative journalism magazine covering politics and culture. It was initially launched in 1940 by Vishwa Nath, becoming a prominent monthly magazine before ceasing publication in 1988. The magazine was revived in 2009 by Anant Nath, who aimed to create a platform for South Asia's literary talents with an emphasis on politics, art, and culture. Since then, it has received multiple awards, including the Louis M. Lyons Award for Integrity in Journalism.

Caravan has faced numerous defamation lawsuits, which are both costly and lengthy. In 2011, it was sued by IIPM for ₹50 crore, leading to a court-ordered takedown of an article, which was later republished in 2018. The magazine faced legal action in 2015 from Essar Group over claims that the company had given gifts to influential individuals. In 2019, Vivek Doval filed a defamation case against the journal after it published allegations involving his business activities. The magazine and several of its editors were also charged with sedition in 2021 for their reporting on a farmer's death during a protest.

History

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In 1940, Vishwa Nath launched Caravan as the first magazine from the Delhi Press; it went on to establish itself as a leading monthly but closed in 1988.[2]

It was again revived in 2009 by Anant Nath, the grand son of Vishwa Nath; Nath was deeply impressed by publications like The Atlantic, Mother Jones etc. during his graduation from Columbia University and sought for The Caravan to be a home for South Asia's rich literary talents.[2][3] In Nath's words, "the idea was [] to have a magazine on politics, art, and culture, with a liberal bend of mind."[2] A few months later, Vinod Jose was roped in as the executive editor; drawing inspiration from long-form American magazines such as Harper's and The New Yorker, he designed the magazine as the home for New Journalism in India.[2] The establishment was successful and its earliest issues featured a host of South Asian Anglophone writers — Pankaj Mishra, Arundhati Roy, and Fatima Bhutto among others.[2]

Gradually, both Nath and Jose planned to cover stories that were ignored by mainstream media — Siddhartha Deb notes the magazine to have simultaneously carried traits of being a newsweekly, book review forum, and a litzine, during those days.[2] By 2010, the journal had become a monthly and the print-circulation exceeded 40,000; Jonathan Shainin joined the same year as an associate editor.[4][2][5] Beginning 2014, with the rise of Narendra Modi in national politics, the magazine has become almost exclusively focused on politics — Nath explains this as a product of mainstream media's increasing reticence to be critical of the government.[2]

As of 2020, the magazine employs 38 people and the website gets about 1.5 million pageviews per month.[2]

Reception

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Jose's profile of Narendra Modi in the March 2012 issue won international acclaim and was referenced by The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Le Monde, and The New York Times.[2] Dexter Filkins, writing for The New Yorker in 2019, noted that The Caravan provided generally critical coverage of the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party government, notwithstanding state intimidation.[6]

In summer 2020, Virginia Quarterly Review commissioned a feature on the magazine, which introducing it as a publication committed to "protecting India’s tradition of democracy and religious pluralism", reiterated Filkin's observation and emphasized the relevance of the publication at a time when the traditional mainstream media had all but buckled before the government.[2] That the Caravan did not receive advertisements from the government, it was not possible for the government to use the traditional "carrot and stick" approach.[2]

Awards

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Individual journalists

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Multiple journalists have received awards for their reportage published in The Caravan.

In 2010, Mehboob Jeelani won a Ramnath Goenka Award for his profile of Syed Ali Geelani.[7][8] In 2011, Jose won a Ramnath Goenka Award for his profiles of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and DMK patriarch M. Karunanidhi;[9] two years later, he was conferred with the Osborn Elliott Prize by the Asia Society for two articles — one on the rebranding of Narendra Modi after the Gujarat Riots, and the other on media ethics. In 2011, Christophe Jaffrelot had also won the Ramnath Goenka Award for a series of op-eds.[9] In 2012, Samanth Subramanian was conferred with Red Ink Award in the category of political reporting as well as media reporting by the Mumbai Press Club for his profiles of Subramanian Swamy and Samir Jain respectively.

In 2014, the publication swept Red Ink Awards — Dinesh Narayanan won two in the category of political reporting for a profile of Mohan Bhagwat and in the category of business reporting for a profile of Jignesh Shah, Leena Gita Reghunath won the one in the category of crime reporting for a profile of Swami Aseemanand, Salil Tripathi won the one in the category of human rights reporting for a discussion of the 1971 war-crimes in Bangladesh, Nikita Saxena won the one in the category of health reporting, and Rahul Bhatia won the one in the category of sports reporting for a profile of N. Srinivasan. Bhatia also won a Ramnath Goenka Award for the same article.[10]

In 2018, Nileena M S won the ACJ Journalism Award in the category of investigative reporting for detailing the rampant corruption in the allocation of coal-blocks in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. The same year, Reghunath won a Red Ink Award for her reporting of gender-biases in Malayalam television under the women empowerment category while Aruna Chandrasekhar won another in the environment category for reporting on the tribal opposition to bauxite mining in Orissa. In 2019, Sagar won Red Ink Award in the category of political reporting for investigative reporting on the Rafale scam while Zishaan A Latif won a Ramnath Goenka Award for documenting the struggles of inclusion in NRC.[11] In 2020, Prabhjit Singh and Arshu John's probings into the Delhi riots won them the ACJ Journalism Award in the category of investigative reporting.[12] In 2021, Sagar won Red Ink Award in the category of crime reporting for his fact-checking of claims made by Central Bureau of Investigation in the context of Muzaffarpur shelter case.[13]

Publication

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In 2021, the publication was conferred with the Louis M. Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism by the Nieman Foundation for Journalism's class of the year at Harvard University; the citation highlighted Caravan's "commitment to conscience and integrity" notwithstanding intimidatory tactics by the state.[14]

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In addition to receiving threatening messages, the magazine has been sued repeatedly for alleged defamation. These lawsuits are costly and typically take years to fight in court.[2] In 2011, the magazine was the subject of a Rs 50 crore defamation suit by the Indian Institute of Planning and Management after it featured a profile of its head, Arindam Chaudhuri.[15] The court awarded an interim injunction to Chaudhuri, ordering the magazine to take the article off its website. In 2018, the Delhi High Court vacated the injunction, allowing the magazine to re-publish the article.[16][17]

The magazine was issued legal notices in April 2013 regarding its May cover story about Attorney General Goolam Essaji Vahanvati but the top three editors decided to continue with its publication.[18]

In 2015, The Caravan was served a legal notice by the Essar Group because the magazine described the business and the family that runs it unfavorably, including evidence that the business gave iPads to 195 journalists, government employees, and politicians.[19] Essar later filed a ₹250 crore civil defamation suit against the magazine; the business did not deny any of the facts presented in the magazine article.[19][20]

In 2016, following the Indian government's demonetization of ₹500 and ₹1,000 notes, The Caravan published an article claiming that Vivek Doval, son of National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, was involved with a hedge fund in the Cayman Islands. In January 2019, Vivek Doval filed a defamation complaint against the magazine and Congress leader Jairam Ramesh for allegedly repeating these defamatory claims.[21] Ramesh had highlighted the article's content during a press conference, which led Doval to assert that the statements were false and damaged his reputation. In December 2020, Ramesh apologized in court, admitting that his remarks were based on the article and recognizing the need for fact verification.[22] The court accepted the apology, closing the case against Ramesh, while the defamation proceedings against The Caravan are ongoing.[23]

In 2021, many journalists and politicians who reported the death of Navreet Singh during the 2021 Farmers' Republic Day parade were charged with sedition by the Delhi Police and the police departments of three Bharatiya Janata Party–ruled states. The police cases were filed against editor and founder Paresh Nath, editor Anant Nath, executive editor Vinod K. Jose and one unnamed person for filing fake news about the cause of death of the farmer. Those charged also included Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, India Today journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, National Herald senior consulting editor Mrinal Pande and Qaumi Awaz editor Zafar Agha.[24] Varadarajan has called the police FIR "malicious prosecution".[25][26] The Press Club of India (PCI), the Editors Guild of India, the Press Association, the Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC), the Delhi Union of Journalists and the Indian Journalists Union in a joint press conference asked the sedition law to be scrapped.[24][27] The Editors Guild of India spoke against invoking of the sedition charge on journalists. The guild termed the FIRs as an "attempt to intimidate, harass, browbeat and stifle the media".[28]

In March 2023, The Caravan was accused of plagiarism after Netherlands-based artist Tijana claimed her artwork of featuring External Affairs Minister, S. Jaishankar was used on the magazine’s cover without permission. The magazine later issued an apology, attributing the incident to a freelance artist and adding credit to Tijana with her consent.[29]

In February, 2024, The Caravan published a piece, "Screams from the Army Post", alledging that members of the Indian army had tortured civilians in Jammu and Kashmir. The Indian government ordered them to take down the story under the Information Technology Act.[30][31]

Criticism

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In 2019, following the Pulwama attack, The Caravan published an article analyzing the caste composition of the 40 personnel killed, noting that most were from OBC, SC, and ST backgrounds with limited upper-caste representation.[32] The article drew sharp criticism from figures including CRPF’s chief spokesperson, Moses Dhinakaran, who called it “divisive,” and Union Minister Rajnath Singh, who emphasized that forces should not be viewed through caste or religious lines. Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti and others echoed similar concerns, while some defended the article, citing ongoing caste influences in the armed forces.[33]

References

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  1. ^ Gottipati, Sruthi (10 May 2010). "The Caravan". The New York Review of Magazines. Retrieved 28 June 2018.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Crowell, Maddy (Summer 2020). "The Messengers: One Small Magazine's Fight for the Indian Mind". Virginia Quarterly Review. Retrieved 8 June 2020.
  3. ^ Shuchi Bansal (24 April 2013). "As magazines dwindle, Delhi Press seeks to add more". Livemint. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  4. ^ "The Caravan – The New York Review of Magazines". Columbia University. 10 May 2010. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  5. ^ "When a Delhi journo joins New Yorker, it's news" (blog). San Serif. 10 October 2013. Retrieved 27 October 2013.
  6. ^ Filkins, Dexter (2 December 2019). "Blood and Soil in Narendra Modi's India". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved 3 December 2019.
  7. ^ Raafi, Muhammad (24 July 2013). "Jeelani, Islah Receive Ramnath Goenka Award". Kashmir Life. Retrieved 1 July 2022.
  8. ^ "Hindustan Times journalists win Ramnath Goenka award". Hindustan Times. 24 July 2013. Retrieved 1 July 2022.
  9. ^ a b "Winners of the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism award for 2011". The Indian Express. 10 September 2014. Retrieved 1 July 2022.
  10. ^ "Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Awards: The story tellers". Financialexpress. Retrieved 1 July 2022.
  11. ^ "Ramnath Goenka Award: Photo journalism award for documenting NRC struggles". The Indian Express. 3 January 2022. Retrieved 1 July 2022.
  12. ^ Team, N. L. "The Wire's Sukanya Shantha and Caravan's Prabhjit Singh and Arshu John win ACJ Journalism Awards 2020". Newslaundry. Retrieved 30 June 2022.
  13. ^ Team, N. L. "RedInk awards: Here's who won and why". Newslaundry. Retrieved 30 June 2022.
  14. ^ "Caravan Magazine Wins Louis M. Lyons Award for its 'Indispensable Reporting' on India". The Wire. Retrieved 30 June 2022.
  15. ^ Peri, Maheshwer (27 September 2016). "How IIPM and Arindam Chaudhury used the defamation law to hide the truth". The Scroll.
  16. ^ "HC lifts gag order on Caravan article on Arindam Chaudhuri of IIPM". The Economic Times. Press Trust of India. 22 February 2018.
  17. ^ "Delhi High Court Vacates Injunction Against The Caravan's IIPM Cover Story; The Magazine Re-Publishes It". The Caravan. 21 February 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2020.
  18. ^ "Reliance's pre-emptive legal notices". The Hoot. 20 May 2013. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  19. ^ a b S, Ramanathan (25 August 2015). "Essar goes after The Caravan with lawsuit for damning article, magazine gives it right back". The News Minute.
  20. ^ "Court grants time to magazine to file reply in defamation suit". The Economic Times. Press Trust of India. 24 August 2015.
  21. ^ "NSA Ajit Doval's son Vivek Doval records statement before court in defamation case against 'The Caravan'". The Hindu. 30 January 2019. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  22. ^ "Jairam Ramesh Tenders Apology To Vivek Doval In Defamation Case". NDTV.com. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  23. ^ "Delhi HC transfers Vivek Doval's criminal defamation case against Caravan Magazine, others to Patiala House Court". BW Businessworld. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  24. ^ a b "Media Bodies Slam FIRs Against Journalists, Want Sedition Law to Be Scrapped". The Wire. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
  25. ^ "Sedition FIRs against Tharoor, journalists now in five states". The Indian Express. 31 January 2021. Retrieved 31 January 2021.
  26. ^ "Delhi Police Case Against Shashi Tharoor, Others After UP, Madhya Pradesh". NDTV.com. Retrieved 31 January 2021.
  27. ^ "Journalists' Bodies Slam Sedition FIRs Against Editors, Reporters for Farmers' Rally Coverage". The Wire. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
  28. ^ "Tractor rally: Editors Guild of India sound alarm at sedition case on journalists". www.telegraphindia.com. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
  29. ^ Commune, The (3 March 2023). "'The Caravan' Accused Of Plagiarizing Jaishankar Cover Story Pic". The Commune. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  30. ^ "India curtails right to information in clampdown two months ahead of elections". Reporters Without Borders. 14 February 2024. Retrieved 21 October 2024.
  31. ^ "Press Council of India issues show-cause notice to The Caravan on Poonch story, betraying its own mandate to protect freedom of press". The Caravan. Retrieved 21 October 2024.
  32. ^ Ashraf, Ajaz. "Urban upper-castes driving Hindutva nationalism have little representation among Pulwama's slain jawans". The Caravan. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  33. ^ "After article dividing Pulwama victims on caste draws flak on Twitter, Pakistan rakes up class of killed CRPF jawans". Firstpost. 22 February 2019. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
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