How many magazines in India will let reporters work on a story for six months?

I can't think of any. Except perhaps for Tehelka, whose editor Tarun Tejpal in 2007 asked his reporter Ashish Khetan to conduct a months-long undercover investigation into the Godhra killings. But among Indian publications Tehelka is unique, as we all know, and it is the exception to many rules.

In the West, on the other hand, many magazines specialise in long-form stories that can take the writers weeks, if not months, to put together.

The latest issue (February 7) of Fortune has one such article — an investigation into the BP oil rig accident in the Gulf of Mexico last April. The magazine's managing editor, Andy Serwer, writes in this issue that two reporters and a researcher "spent six months interviewing scores of interested parties and travelling across the U.S. and to London to interview, among others, three BP CEOs, current and former, including an unrepentant Tony Hayward and his predecessor, the architect of the modern BP, John Browne".

Serwer also explains why Fortune took up this mammoth investigation:

To do the biggest business stories right requires a significant investment of time and effort. It's an investment that frankly is becoming rare these days, but to me and the rest of us at Fortune it's a risk well worth taking if executed properly. The payoff — a long-form magazine story that provides understanding well beyond the daily ticktock — has almost unquantifiable value. As in, "Ah, I finally get what happened." How much is that worth?

And what do readers actually get? Back to Serwer:

The result is a rich, highly engaging tale told here in this issue — all 10,500-odd words of it — that gives a holistic picture of BP and what led up to the disaster in an analytical and cinematic fashion.

Six months. 10,500-odd words. Again my question: Which Indian magazine will permit its reporters to spend six months for a 10,500-word story?

• PS: The BP story is not up yet on the Fortune website because this issue is still on the stands. Check back later and read "BP: 'An accident waiting to happen'."
• Commitscion Noyon Jyoti Parasara (Class of 2007) has sent me the link to another fascinating example of long-form investigative journalism on the ProPublica website: "Pakistan and the Mumbai attacks: The untold story". (For the uninitiated, ProPublica is probably the most well-known media outlet for public interest journalism.)