Nira Radia, a PR professional – or to put it plainly, a lobbyist – dictated what goes into senior editor Vir Sanghvi’s column and what NDTV anchor Barkha Dutt should tell the Congress ahead of cabinet formation, going by the telephonic conversations authorities tapped (read the transcripts here or read a report here).

There’s much more here than merely consulting an expert before writing a column or anchoring a story. Veteran and iconic journalists purportedly took brief from a corporate lobbyist and purportedly coordinated the backdoor wheeling-dealing of a cabinet formation on behalf of business tycoons, if these tapes are authentic. While we are in no position to endorse the content, wouldn’t these opinion-makers have asked a politician to resign pending an inquiry?

The tapes reveal the ugly side of two of our venerable four estates.

As for the media, a veteran editor who plays a role in helping millions of readers form opinion (we are being charitable here), stands compromised. This is only an extension of the business of paid news (read our analysis and the Press Council’s unpublicised report here . While the other three estates have a degree of public accountability, the fourth estate goes scot free. A voter can question an MP once in five years, but as a reader she has no way to question the editor.

As for the polity, the tapes raise the spectre of ‘corporate democracy’, for the corporates, by the corporates and of the corporates. To stem this trend, as a small step, shouldn’t the guardians of the public interest – Hindustan Times and NDTV in this case – ask Sanghvi and Dutt to step down and face inquiry?