T. Tejpal & S. Sharma:  blame him

DRAMATIS PERSONAE: Tarun Tejpal, CEO, Tehelka.com; Shankar Sharma, CEO, First Global.

SUPPORTING CAST: Enforcement Directorate, the Income Tax Department, sundry government agencies.

Act I.
''I pray you, how many hath he killed and eaten in these wars?''
After exposing the sordid world of match-fixing in cricket, Tehelka in March 13, 2001, becomes the first dotcom to shake a government. Hidden cameras expose the murky worlds of political financing and defence deals.

Act II.
''He hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age, doing, in the figure of a lamb, the feats of a lion.''
Tejpal and Tehelka are celebrated nationwide, as harbingers of the free, break-the-rules world of dotcom. Mounting pressure causes Defence Minister George Fernandes resign on 'moral grounds' in April, 2001. The army begins to introspect.

Act III.
''Alas! He gets nothing by that.''
The government and politicians close ranks. Tehelka's big jump in page views doesn't translate into any increase in advertising on the site. Nor does its valuation jump, all thanks to the dotcom crash.

...And there's the small matter of its investors, First Global, being probed by the government with retrospective interest.

...And then September 11 happens, the smokescreens rise high, and Fernandes returns as Defence Minister in November 2001.

Tarun Tejpal: ''The swearing-in ritual had barely been over that our phones began to buzz...''
The government closes in on the angel investor. There are 25 raids on Shankar Sharma's residence and offices; around 200 summons have been issued thus far.

Shankar Sharma: ''If all they want me to do is to exit Tehelka, don't they realise they are only making it tougher for me to do so?... I've been trying to find a buyer for my shares in Tehelka since September 2000. Look now, with the hell that they are making me go through, will anybody be willing to invest in Tehelka anymore?''

Act IV.
''Who is his companion now?''
Desperate by now, Sharma and Tejpal take their case to the Press.

Sharma to GoI: ''We'll sue you for Rs 500 crore in damages.''

GoI (in hushed tones): ''Do your worst.''

Act V.
To be continued.

Wired Wisdom

Thou Shalt Celebrate
THE NEW LIFE IN E-MARKETPLACES.

Now, the Global Trading Web Association (GTWA), an independent member organisation of electronic marketplaces, points out that transactions in electronic marketplaces have increased from 106,168 to 884,166, a cool 733 per cent hike when comparing January-June 2001 activity with same time period in 2000. Says Gartner G2 analyst Gale Daikoku: ''E-marketplaces are not dead! Our research continues to debunk that myth.'' Long live then.

Thou Shalt Mourn
THE DANGER TO OPEN SOURCE.

Yes, in these hard times, the credo of open-source software creation on systems such as Linux is being diluted as a new wave of pragmatism sweeps through struggling start-ups. Companies distributing free software hoped to get revenues by selling support and services. But that just has not proved sustainable. Many have switched to a closed-source licence, and now they often build a proprietary product on top of an open-source foundation. That could mean the best of both worlds-or the worst.

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