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Zakaria apologises for plagiarism

Noted Indian-American journalist and author Fareed Zakaria has been suspended by his employers, news channel CNN and Time magazine, after he admitted to plagiarism and apologised for the ethical lapse.

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Noted Indian-American journalist and author Fareed Zakaria has been suspended by his employers, news channel CNN and Time magazine, after he admitted to plagiarism and apologised for the ethical lapse.

Zakaria released an official statement on Friday, in which he admitted that portions of an article he had written for Time on gun control “bear close similarities” to paragraphs from an essay about the National Rifle Association printed in The New Yorker magazine in April. “I made a terrible mistake,” wrote Zakaria in his apology. “It is a serious lapse and one that is entirely my fault. I apologise unreservedly to her, to my editors at Time, and to my readers.”

Zakaria, 48, is one of the most eminent names in journalism today. Born and raised in Mumbai, Zakaria was a student of Cathedral and John Connon School. He graduated from Yale University and completed his doctorate in political science from Harvard University. Zakaria worked with Newsweek for a decade and became editor at large at Time in 2010. The same year, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to journalism. He also hosted a show on CNN and is a columnist for The Washington Post.

On Monday, August 20th, Zakaria’s column titled ‘The Case for Gun Control’, was published, and CNN.com carried a blog post by him on the same issue soon after. Media watchdogs quickly pointed out the similarities between Zakaria’s writing and that of Harvard University professor Jill Lepore in the April 23 edition of The New Yorker.

After the release of Zakaria’s statement, Time announced that it had accepted Zakaria’s apology “but what he did violates our own standards for our columnists”. Consequently, Zakaria has been suspended for a month.







CNN.com has removed Zakaria’s post from their website and released an official statement confirming the removal and suspension of Zakaria from the news channel “while this matter is under review.” Both companies are owned by Time Warner.
This is not the first time Zakaria has come under the scanner for originality and honesty. In June, Zakaria was criticised for recycling the commencement speech he delivered to Duke University students at the ceremony organised for this year’s graduating class of Harvard University. More seriously, in 2009, Jeffrey Goldberg, a national correspondent for The Atlantic magazine, pointed out that Zakaria had used quotes from one of Goldberg’s articles in a Newsweek story about Iran, but without attributing them to Goldberg.
Time has said in its statement that Zakaria, who has been temporarily suspended, will be under review for this coming month, suggesting that a final decision about the seriousness of Zakaria’s mistake will be reached at the end of this period.

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