Sagarika Ghose

Some Lesser Known Facts About Sagarika Ghose

• Sagarika Ghose is a prominent Indian journalist, columnist and author. At BBC World on Question Time India, she has worked as a prime time anchor.

• Since 1991, Ghose has been working as a journalist. She has worked at The Times Of India, Outlook magazine and The Indian Express.

  

• After leaving her career in print media, soon, she joined broadcast media and initially worked as the deputy editor and a prime time anchor on the news network CNN-IBN.

  

• Bhaskar Ghose is the father of Sagarika Ghose former Indian Administrative Service 1960 batch, erstwhile Director-General of Doordarshan, the Indian public television network.

• Ghose is the author of two novels – ‘The Gin Drinkers’ published in 1998 and ‘Blind Faith’ in 2004.

• In 2005, she earned an Excellence in Journalism Award (Aparajita Award) from FICCI Ladies Organisation.

• In 2009, she was awarded the Gr8-ITA Award for Excellence in Journalism.

  

• Sagarika Ghosh received the CF Andrews Award for Distinguished Alumnus from St Stephen’s College in 2012.

• In 2013, Ghose was awarded the ITA Best Anchor Award from the Indian Television Academy (ITA).

• She was listed by the Rhodes Project on the list of 13 famous women Rhodes Scholars in 2014.

• In July 2014, she resigned from CNN-IBN as deputy editor after the news network was purchased by Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited. Soon after quitting the job at CNN-IBN, she began working as a consulting editor of The Times of India.

• Her two aunts include Arundhati Ghose, former ambassador and diplomat and Ruma Pal, former justice of the Supreme Court of India.

• Ghose’s father in law, Dilip Sardesai was the former Indian Test Cricketer.

• Ghose received the ITA Best Anchor Award from the Indian Television Academy (ITA) in 2013.

• In 2013, she interviewed the Aam Aadmi Party candidate Arvind Kejriwal before the general elections in Delhi. It was the first time that an Indian politician gave a social media interview just before the elections.

• In a show on 9 November 2011, Ghose introduced Hindu spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar as “joining us tonight” and asked him several questions, contradicting and criticizing his answers. Whenever Ravi Shankar was on screen, “CNN-IBN Live” was shown on the video feed. However, Ravi Shankar was interviewed even earlier that day, and his statements were edited and presented as answers to Ghose’s live questions. When this was criticized Ghose cited “technical issues” before she and CNN-IBN later gave a formal apology.

• Sagarika Ghose won several awards in journalism. She is the writer of the biography of Indira Gandhi, ‘Indira: India’s Most Powerful Prime Minister’ that she published in 2017.

• In 2017, Sagarika met Barack Obama, the former president of America. She shared a picture of her with him on her Twitter account.

  

• In 2017, Sagarika Ghose earned the C.H.Mohammed Koya National Award for journalism.

• In 2018, in her non-fiction book, ‘Why I Am A Liberal: A Manifesto For Indians Who Believe in Individual Freedom,’ she narrated herself as a liberal who followed the rules in law, personal liberty, limited government, and strong institutions. In the thesis of this non-fiction book, it was mentioned that,
  

  Although the republic of India was founded as a liberal democracy in 1947, subsequent Indian governments throughout the post-Independence period have sought to attack individual liberty and vastly increase the powers of the government, or the powers of what she calls the Indian ‘Big State.”         

• In 2018, she posted an old picture when she felt wonderfully enlightened after meeting the former king of Bhutan HE Jigme Singye.

  

• Sagarika has been often invited by various Indian literature festival events.

  

• In her book Indira, Sagarika Ghose stated that Indira Gandhi remained unhappy most of her life. She wrote,
  

  She was surprised to find out that her relationship with her father was not a close one. Indira was born when the eldest child was expected to be a male. Indira was the scion of the Nehru family. Her father expected her to be fit, brilliant, horse ride, ski and do yoga. His expectations were high, and she was constantly failing him.”

  She further stated Indira’s relations with her father,

  After failing out of Oxford, Indira married a man her father hated. She was unhappy throughout her life personally. Her relationships with her family were fractious — with her sons, father and her husband.”

• Sagarika Ghose is a public speaker and is often seen speaking at several motivational events.

  

• Sagarika is an animal lover. She often posts pictures of her pet dog on her social media account.

  

• In an interview, Ghosh was asked that how did she face threats and hate in journalism. She said,
  

  If you want to write, blog or be a journalist, you need to be brave. Why is the press important? The press is important because it’s there, where the people aren’t. You are doing it for the benefit of the people, as a service to the people. Some of us are high profile journalists, which is why we are protected. But there are journalists who are being killed.”

• In a conversation with a media house, Sagarika explained the highest point in her journalistic career. She narrated,
  

  Ever since I joined the media, it has been a great experience. Travelling around, presiding over various maramaari on Television, reporting on the ground have all been a great slice of life.”

• According to Sagarika, the turning point in television news media was the rise of the Modi government in India. She said in an interview,
  

  Frankly, it happened with the coming of Modi. The Congress was bad with giving media freedom and it constantly breathed down our necks. But this government is vindictive. They hold personal animosities against individual journalists.”

• In 2024, she was nominated by the AITC party for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections. ^[4]Rediff

• In December 2024, TMC MP Sagarika Ghose filed a privilege motion against Kiren Rijiju in the Lok Sabha after he referred to opposition MPs as “unworthy” of being in the parliament. More than 60 MPs backed her petition and sought disciplinary action against him.