It was exactly 5 years ago that JAM magazine first published the story 'The Truth about IIPM'S Tall Claims' in its issue dated Jun 15-29 2005.
This was the first time that any media in India had examined the claims made by IIPM in its ubiquitous full page advertisements where it dared students to 'dream beyond IIMs'.
As readers of this blog would be aware, IIPM carried out a malicious personal attack on me, for publishing this article. Legal action was threatened but never initiated.
We had full documentary evidence for every claim we had questioned, and wherever we had found the institute lacking.
Last week, there was a new development.
We recieved a notice from Silchar in Assam, where the Hon Civil Judge no 1 at Cachat had passed an injunction restraining us from displaying the above article. As per the court's instruction, we have temporarily removed the link to the article.
Let me assure you JAM will seek legal recourse against this injunction. As the matter is sub-judice I would not like to get into the details.
However, the following questions are pertinent:
1) If IIPM had a strong case why did it not file one in 2005. when the article was originally published?
2) The head office of JAM is in Mumbai, while that of IIPM is in New Delhi. So why has a case been filed in Silchar?
Apart from this, why does IIPM continue to fight a proxy internet campaign to malign me by spidering a blog created by 'IIPM Student-9' where I am referred to as a trickster publishing a yellow journal.
(No I am not providing a link here, the offending page appears when you type my name in google on the first page of 'search results'.)
I have faith in the country's judicial system as regards the protection of free speech. And I believe journalists must continue to write free and fair reports in the public interest, regardless of the pressures and pulls involved.
Thank you all for your love and support.
