India Times Goes Cryptic

August 21, 2004 2:31 PM

Non-NewsFilter From the India Times: "The family cannot be named because we have no written proof. Nor can we give details of the exact nature of the trouble, because that would reveal more than would be prudent, at least for the moment." Or maybe the India Onion.
Just doing my part in keeping the 'Filter from being too USA-centric, via a Monkee who apparently knows who the story's talking about.
posted by wendell (12 comments total)

(The paper is called "The Times of India", just for the record.)

It's painfully obvious that they're talking about the powerful Ambani family, who manage the Reliance group, one of the largest businesses in India.

Of course, I'm not surprised the Times of India resorts to crap "reporting" like this. Over the last few years, they've prostituted their content, made a mockery of "editorial integrity", and are called the "Trash of India" or "Slimes of India" by many.

(Sadly, they're the world's largest selling English broadsheet, would you believe?)
posted by madman at 3:24 PM on August 21, 2004

The reason this is interesting is because the Times of India isn't (considered) a tabloid. I "apparently know who" because from the not-too-vague allusions in the story, there's a ready match to only certain personalities within the Indian public consciousness.

I haven't read a paper version of the Times for some years now, but the online version stinks to the extent that I can't tell whether the website is the equivalent of the Pravda online (which is unrelated to the now-I-believe-defunct print Pravda).
posted by Gyan at 3:28 PM on August 21, 2004

here's more on the Ambani brothers,from Time Asia: The Families That Own Asia
posted by amberglow at 3:28 PM on August 21, 2004

oops....here it is--sorry
posted by amberglow at 3:29 PM on August 21, 2004

I personally am taken by the phrase "so upset he virtually skipped his meals".
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 3:34 PM on August 21, 2004

they still live in the same house together, with their mother?
posted by amberglow at 3:38 PM on August 21, 2004

Correction acknowledged. (What can you expect? I'm a USAmerican.) Make that The Onion of India.

I just thought it was all worded so funny, I virtually lost my lunch.
posted by wendell at 4:30 PM on August 21, 2004

amber, that's called a joint family, where brothers live together with their parents in the same house. Think of it like the house in Dynasty.
posted by riffola at 5:06 PM on August 21, 2004

I suspect they can afford a B-I-G house.
posted by wendell at 5:25 PM on August 21, 2004

even multi-millionaires?
posted by amberglow at 6:57 PM on August 21, 2004

i'd be feuding with my brother too, if we had to see each other at work and at home.
posted by amberglow at 7:17 PM on August 21, 2004

amberglow, joint families in India are more common than over there. Indian culture values the familial unit far more than the individualist American society.

I am, however, very much an individualist and a support of nuclear families. ;)

Thanks for the Time link. I wanted to link it in my earlier comment, but couldn't be arsed hunting for it.

As Gyan says, the combination of references - two brothers, large business groups, father passed away recently, etc. could only mean Reliance. If ToI had published the story with names, they might have been open to a libel lawsuit. That, and the stock market would crash big time.

If this turns out to be true in the next few months, I expect the ToI to boldly thump their chests and shout, "we were there first! yay!"
posted by madman at 11:05 PM on August 21, 2004