New York, June 7 (IANS) Indian American Jyoti Thottam has been named Time magazine’s South Asia bureau chief in New Delhi. Currently the magazine’s New York-based senior editor, she takes up the new assignment next month. Thottam replaces Simon Robinson, who held the position since 2006 and now moves to Time’s London office as senior editor, a memo from Rick Stengel, the magazine’s managing editor, said.

India born Thottam was raised mostly in suburban Houston. She came to Time magazine from On magazine/Time Digital, and before that was a reporter in Queens, New York, and in Jacksonville, Florida. After graduating from Yale and earning a master’s from Columbia in international affairs, Thottam got her break in journalism as a Wall Street Journal intern.

Thottam traveled around India as a freelancer after grad school and is looking forward to covering South Asia for Time.

“South Asia is one of the most exciting places in the world right now, and after 10 years in New York City, I was ready to try something new. I can’t imagine a better place to be a journalist, and I’m looking forward to covering the region’s stories, big and small,” she told the South Asian Journalists Association, whose former president she is.

While at Time, her best remembered cover story was on outsourcing, “Is your job going abroad” in the March 1, 2004 issue. She appeared on the PBS show “Charlie Rose” that week to discuss the issue along with renowned economist Jagdish Bhagwati.

Other South Asians in prominent positions at Time magazine’s New York headquerters include Romesh Ratnesar, one of two deputy managing editors under Stengel, foreign editor Bobby Ghosh, and chief of reporters Ratu Kamlani.

Stengel’s memo also noted Time Asia’s senior editor Zoher Abdoolcarim’s move as Time International’s Asia editor based in Hong Kong.

There have been several high-profile new appointments of South Asians at major US publications in 2008: Davan Maharaj became managing editor of the Los Angeles Times, Vindu Goel was named deputy technology editor of The New York Times, and Stephanie Mehta took over as global editor of Fortune magazine.