Q. From a journalist and a writer to an entrepreneur,how has your journey been?
A: Full of learning(laughs). I didn’t set out to be an entrepreneur. I set out to be a journalist and a writer. The entrepreneurship came about by accident. Mostly by a need to be myself. More elbow room and space to crafting out the business of journalism.At one point i felt that i could not do the kind of journalism i wanted to do until i also had some amount of commercial leverage in the company. it was then that i realised that the red line between the owner and the journalist has to be collapsed.

Q. During your journey as a journalist,with the kind of competitive media we have, you must have faced a lot of challenges. How did you overcome them?
A: Whenever such a situation came up, i asked myself the fundamental questions- why did i do this? why i am here? why am i trying to do?will what i want to do work out better this way or the other? i have been faced with crisis several hundred times in the last few years and i have always tried to re-ask myself the fundamental questions. if you ask yourself the right questions, you get the right answers. its a very individual call- what did i set out to do? if you have that in your sight, everything else works out by itself.

Q. Any comments/ advice for the future entrepreneur.
A: i have a great respect for entrepreneurs. entrepreneurs create the world. the aeroplanes we fly, the cars we drive in, the hotels we go to , the movies we make. an entrepreneur is involved in all these activities. but there is a kind of framework that every entrepreneur must understand. and its that framework that i struggled to understand all the time. the framework is the world. we must understand it. the world does not exist solely for us. my despair is that there are a large number of entrepreneurs who are successful at what they o but they do not understand the larger framework. because of which they do a dis-service to the mankind at large and to themselves.

Q. As a country, as a people, what problems does India face?
A: In my view, the two biggest problems that India faces today are inequality and communalism. close to 400 million people in India live below the poverty line, and we say that India is shining. nearly 250 million people in our country are “untouchables”. in reality there are two indias. this is the kind of disparity we have. then again, we are a very violent people, a very communal people. we are not just, we are not tolerant.The shining India may choose to ignore this, but inequality and communalism are a part of the Indian reality.

Q. To talk about tehelka, could you give us a brief sketch of its path till now.
A: When we were laying the foundation of tehelka magazine, getting funding was so tough. we met so many people and invariably all of them said that they totally loved us. but they would not not enter into collaboration with us. after it started, time and again we’ve had to face crisis. in 2007, when we brought out the story of state involvement in the Gujarat riots, there was such an uproar. funds were pulled out and tehelka almost closed, but somehow we made it through. we covered the propaganda against SIMI, almost 90% of the SIMI people jailed for terrorist activities were innocent. the point was to bring out the communal prejudice.

Q. Tell us something about your religious beliefs.
A: I am an agnostic. but i set store by the Hindu philosophy of dharma and karma. dharma signifies beliefs and karma stands for the right conduct.

Q. here’s a standard question, the most important things in life…..
A: laughter and love, definitely. if you have one of these two you will sail through. i am lucky enough to have both of them in my life. in fact, one of the most important lessons i learned from Gandhi is humor…laughter. laughter got me through the toughest times of my life.

Q. your first book “the alchemy of desire” has really strong female characters, are you strongly pro female?
A: yes, totally. i believe the future belongs to the women. i believes that men have no future. in my life, whether at home or at work, all the really inspirational and powerful people are women. i think that they are very much the superior gender.

Q. contrasted with tehelka, which is largely optimistic, your books, especially “the story of my assassins”, have been touted as pessimistic. your comments.
A: well its just an examination of the kind of country we are. a lot of people say its an angry book. if that’s what people feel then I’m quite happy, because I’m really angry. I’m angry with the state of this country. I’m angry with the inequality and the injustice of India.so its OK, I’m really happy with the fact[that my book has been labelled "angry"]. i mean as a literary writer, my work is very different from that as a journalist. as a journalist i know what is right, what is wrong, what am i supposed to do. as a literary writer I’m really on the verge of discovery. as a journalist I’m a warrior, as a novelist I’m a seeker.

Q. how is it that other newspapers in India do not seem to be covering the kind of issues you do?
A: you will have to ask them that question[laughs]. i think its too much on the commercial end of the game.its OK if a newspaper has an ideology….everyone has a view. but where facts are concerned, you can’t twist facts. that’s a cardinal rule.

Q. what is your message to the youth of IIT?
A: this is something that pulled me through really tough times, so i would say – hold your nerves. you need the courage to act. and once you decide what you have set out to do, you have to persevere in your endeavours. perseverance is the one quality that sets the great people apart. and be aware of your social responsibility. you are the privileged people you must help create an equal and just society. there is too much noise in the world, we need to turn the volume down. you need to find a language to communicate.