BOARD OF DIRECTORS
RAJDEEP SARDESAI
Rajdeep Sardesai, our Vice-Chairman is currently the President of Editors Guild of India. He is also Editor-in-Chief of CNN-IBN, IBN7, IBN Lokmat channels under the IBN Network. He has 20 years of journalistic experience in print and television.
Mr. Sardesai is also Chairman of our upcoming Development Journalism institute-‘i-CORD’
Prior to setting up the IBN network channels, he was the Managing Editor of both NDTV 24X7 and NDTV India and was responsible for overseeing the news policy for both the channels. Mr. Rajdeep Sardesai has also worked with The Times of India for over five years and was City Editor of its Mumbai edition at the age of 26. During the last 20 years, he has covered major national and international stories, specialising in national politics.
He has won numerous awards for journalistic excellence, including the prestigious Padma Shri for journalism in 2008, the International Broadcasters’ award for coverage of the 2002 Gujarat riots and the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism award for 2007. He has won the Asian Television Award for talk show presentation and has been News Anchor of the year at the Indian Television Academy for six of the last seven years.
Mr. Sardesai has done his Masters and LLB from Oxford University. He played for Oxford University Cricket team.
Former Indian test cricketer, Dilip Sardesai and Prof. Nandini Sardesai, renowned sociologist from Bombay University are his parents. Rajdeep is married to Sagarika Ghose, author and journalist with CNN-IBN.
SAMEER MANCHANDA
Sameer Manchanda, our Director is the Chairman and promoter of DEN Networks Ltd. He formed DEN in 2007 with a vision to transform India’s fragmented cable TV industry and create an Indian cable giant.
In less than 2 years he built DEN from scratch to India’s largest cable distribution company serving 10 million households. He spearheaded the formation of Star DEN, a path-breaking 50-50 JV with News Corp’s Star, creating a one of its kind distribution company that houses 23 powerful channels. DEN went public in late 2009 and is a $600 million company today. DEN features in the Business Standard BS 1000 annual ranking of Indian companies. Sameer has over 2 decades’ experience in Indian media and has been one of the key players in its evolution.
He is a qualified chartered accountant and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India. He has been associated with the television industry since 1984 and has considerable and varied experience and expertise in distribution; media sector operations, strategic and financial planning, capital structuring, mergers and acquisitions, collaborations and joint ventures.
After a long association with NDTV, where he served as a Director on its Board, he co-founded ibn18 Broadcast Ltd. where he served as the Joint Managing Director. IBN18 is the home of seven leading channels spanning the major TV genres.
He also served as the President of the News Broadcasters Association, the industry association for India’s leading news broadcasters. Sameer was recognized as one of the top 10 Indian media executives in 2009 by the portal Indiantelevision.com.
BARKHA DUTT
Barkha Dutt, our Director is currently Group Editor of NDTV English news overseeing the Editorial operations of all English News channels. She is the youngest Editor of a mainstream media organization in India today. She is also a columnist and the most popular woman journalist in India today.
Ms. Barkha Dutt gained prominence for her reporting of Kargil war. She has already won many national and international awards for her reporting and television programmes. She is also recipient of prestigious Padma Shri award.
Ms. Dutt is educated at St. Stephens College, Delhi, Jamia Milia Islamia, and Columbia University. She has won Inlaks scholarship for her higher studies.
She was chosen as the ‘Global Leader for Tomorrow’ by the World Economic Forum.
Her mother Prabha Dutt was Bureau Chief of Hindustan Times and her father is a retired official with Air India. Her sister Bahar Dutt is an environmental reporter with CNN-IBN.
VIJAI TRIVEDI
Vijai Trivedi, our Chairman and is currently Consultant to NDTV. He holds dual position in our organization as he is also the Editor-in-Chief.
He is one of the most respected TV journalists in India. Well known for his weekly talk show-‘Chakravyuh’, he is an authority in Parliamentary reporting.
Mr Vijai Trivedi hails from Jaipur and started his journalistic career with Rajasthan Patrika. He shifted to Television with Vinod Dua’s ‘Parakh’. He was the first person recruited by NDTV to manage the Hindi division.
Known for his great humour sense, he writes a weekly column in ‘NDTV Khabar’ He has been an office bearer of many associations of Journalists in India including Press Advisory council of Lok Sabha.
SWAPNA EVEREST
Swapna Everest our Managing Director is an Engineer by profession. An IT professional with immense experience with two global giants, IBM and Congnizant Technologies, she is the Chief architect of our efforts to converge technology and Development Journalism. A hands on manager, Ms. Swapna along with our Editor has ideated the entire plan for creating a first of its kind alternative media for India.
Ms. Swapna is leading many charitable activities in her capacity as the Trustee of Abba Education Foundation, a charitable society working on educating the students belonging to the BPL (Below Poverty Line) category but with potential to excel.
Earlier she was also Advisor to MEPCEE Electrical Engineers on various engineering projects on communication.
Ms. Swapna Everest is an academic achiever and guides our Board on technical as well as the management needs of this project. As the Chief executive, she looks after the day-to-day functioning of all the departments of this project.
