By Matters India Reporter
Mumbai, Feb 28, 2025: The Mumbai Press Club joined media persons to mourn the death of Ashley D’Mello, a stalwart journalist who covered a wide spectrum of issues during a career spanned over four decades.
D’Mello died after a brief illness in the evening of February 28 at Holy Family Hospital in Bandra, a Mumbai suburb. He was 69. He was hospitalized earlier in the week due to low lung infection, said a condolence message from the press club.
His funeral will be held on March 3 in Bandra.
“He worked for 25 years with The Times of India and earlier with The Indian Express and The Free Press Journal. He was also associated with the national news agency United News of India and wrote for Time Magazine from India,” the message added.
It observed that throughout “his illustrious career,” D’Mello covered politics, crime, civic affairs, environment, infrastructure, business, and community matters.
His journalistic excellence earned him a fellowship from Wolfson College, Cambridge, and he was also a visiting scholar at the Graduate School of Journalism, University of California, Berkeley.
Michael Gonsalves, D’Mello’s former colleague, mourning the death said, “We have indeed lost a good journalist who wrote stories that mattered to society at large without fear or favour,
Gonsalves, a former president of the Indian Catholic Press Association, said D’Mello was a “meticulous reporter, who also covered news about Church affairs independently and often critically to bring out the truth without bias.”
“He was a good journalist remaining faithful to his vocation as truth teller to make issues understandable to the reader,” added Gonsalves, who is now based in Pune.
Nirmala Carvalho, a Mumbai-based veteran journalist who reports for international Church publications, said she found in D’Mello an intellectual and idealistic person, who was friendly and helpful to others. “He often checked with me about Church politics – local and Vatican,” she told Matters India.
D’Mello was born in Mumbai and raised in Calcutta and New Delhi.
He studied English and History at St Stephen’s College, New Delhi, did his masters in history at the University of Mumbai and received a diploma in journalism from Mumbai’s Xavier Institute of Communications.
As a visiting scholar at the University of California at Berkeley, he did research on Urban Development issues. He started his journalism career in Mumbai in 1982. He worked for The Times of India for 25 years. He wrote for the Indian Express and the Free Press Journal and the United News of India.
One of the highlights of his career was covering Goa as a state for the Times of India for four years. During this period, he wrote about politics in the state, environment problems, the challenges thrown up by tourism and social issues.