Rajdeep Sardesai

Rajdeep Sardesai
Born Rajdeep Dilip Sardesai
24 May 1965
Gujarat, India
Nationality Indian
Education St. Xavier's College
University College, Oxford
Occupation Current: Consulting editor at India Today group. Former News Anchor & Editor-in-chief of IBN18 Network
Resigned in July,2014[1]
Years active 1988 – present
Notable credit(s) India at 9
Spouse(s) Sagarika Ghose
Children 2

Rajdeep Sardesai (born 24 May 1965) is an Indian news reader and author. Sardesai is currently a consulting editor at the India Today group and will be doing a marquee show for Headlines Today.[2][3] He was the Editor-in-Chief of IBN18 Network, that includes CNN-IBN, IBN7 and IBN-Lokmat from where he left in July 2014.

He is married to Sagarika Ghose.

Early life

Rajdeep Sardesai's father, Dileep Sardesai, is a former Indian test cricketer.

Book

After resigning from the CNN-IBN group which happened almost immediately after the 2014 Loksabha elections, Sardesai authored a book 2014: The Election that Changed India[4] which was released on 1 November 2014.

Education

The son of the Indian Test cricketer Dilip Sardesai, he completed his schooling up to ICSE from the Campion School in Mumbai, did two years of ISC from The Cathedral & John Connon School, Mumbai, and completed a bachelor's course in Economics from St. Xavier's College. He then went to University College, Oxford, getting the degrees of Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts, and Bachelor of Civil Law.[5] While at Oxford he made six first-class cricket appearances for Oxford University and one for a combined Oxford and Cambridge side against the 1987 Pakistani touring team.[6] He was awarded a cricket Blue.

Career

Rajdeep Sardesai has worked with The Times of India for six years and was the city editor of its Mumbai edition. He entered television journalism in 1994 as Political Editor of New Delhi Television (NDTV). He was the Managing Editor of both NDTV 24X7 and NDTV India and was responsible for overseeing the news policy for both the channels. He hosted popular show like 'The Big Fight' at NDTV. He later quit NDTV to start his own company, Global Broadcast News (GBN), in collaboration with the American giant CNN and Raghav Bahl's TV18.[7] The latter broadcasts the Indian Edition of CNBC called CNBC-TV18, the Hindi consumer channel, CNBC Awaaz and an international channel, SAW. The new channel with Sardesai as the Editor-in-Chief has been named CNN-IBN. It went on air on 17 December 2005. Channel 7 has also come under this umbrella after Sardesai's company bought a 46 percent stake in the channel. Channel 7 has since been renamed IBN7. He has also been the President of the Editors Guild of India, the only television journalist to hold the post and was chosen a Global leader for tomorrow by the world economic forum in 2000.


During the total career, he has covered major national and international stories, specialising in national politics. He has contributed to several books and writes a fortnightly column that appears in several newspapers.

Network-18 acquisition and aftermath

On 29 May 2014, Reliance Industries Ltd announced it would be acquiring control in Network 18 Media & Investments Ltd, the parent of CNN-IBN,IBN7 and CNBC.[8] The board of RIL approved funding of up to Rs. 40 billion to Independent Media Trust (IMT), of which RIL is the sole beneficiary, for acquisition of control in Network 18 and its subsidiaries.[9]

Rajdeep, along with the entire founding team - editorial and managerial- resigned from the Network18 group. Rajdeep, editor-in-chief of CNN IBN, wrote in a letter to the employees before his resignation, "Editorial independence and integrity have been articles of faith in 26 years in journalism and maybe I am too old now to change!".[10][11]

References

External links