English language newspapers, especially in the capital, went to town over the differences in the reports of the Apollo Hospitals and Dr Lal's Path Labs, where the former said Rahul Mahajan's blood reports did not suggest drug overdose while the latter revealed the opposite. 'Someone's Lying' screamed the day's headlines of one English language daily. Most regional newspapers, however, downplayed the Apollo angle. |
In Chennai, where Apollo is headquartered, leading Tamil daily Dinamalar did not even carry the police's allegations against the hospital nor, naturally, the denial by the hospital's authorities. |
In the north, most newspapers carried the Rahul Mahajan jail and bail stories as the day's leads and had smaller page one stories on the status of the case, speculating on whether or not bail would be given. Dainik Bhaskar had a small story on page one of the FIR being filed against the hospital and another box on page one explaining what the charges against the hospital were. |
Another day, a box on page one quoted the hospital's Anupam Sibal who conducted the press conference giving Mahajan a clean chit, as saying he had not resigned. Bhaskar reporters were chasing rumours during the day that Sibal had resigned. Punjab Kesri had a small item on page one saying that the hospital's chairman Dr Prathap Reddy was to be questioned by the police and Rajasthan Patrika dismissed the episode by mentioning the FIR in a bullet in the story on Mahajan being sent to jail. |
All the leading Kannada dailies Vijaya Karnataka, Praja Vani and Kannada Prabha carried regular updates on the case but the Apollo fallout was neither discussed nor analysed in detail by any of the newspapers. Only Praja Vani carried a small report on the Apollo case. |
Vijaya Karnataka had a special report on the lifestyle of famous politicians' children. Rahul Mahajan's arrest was displayed on the front page of all the newspapers. While the other two papers were straightforward in their coverage, Kannada Prabha, belonging to the New Indian Express group, mixed news with views and was critical of Mahajan. |
In Chennai, the news on allegations against Apollo Hospital's doctors didn't hit the pages of leading Tamil daily Dinamalar in the past few days. However, the daily carried reports relating to Rahul Mahajan's case regularly in one of its inside pages. |
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