Hyphens again, folks. You need to be careful while creating a noun from a phrasal verb. By and large, the rule of the thumb says that you need to hyphenate the noun.
Read this (Big names in sleaze story; Hindustan Times; June 25, 2006):
While Anand Suman Singh, a Uttaranchal Sahitya Kala Sanskriti Parishad member has been arrested for allegedly procuring call girls to supply them to politicians and bureaucrats, speculations are rife about a massive cover up to prevent more names being made public.
It should have been cover-up. When you try to cover something up, you say they are trying to cover up.
Another recent instance of wrong usage (Rahul paid Rs 2 lakh bill; The Financial Express; June 23, 2006):
The police are trying to create an impression among the public that the doctors and management of Apollo are engaged in a cover up operation through ‘inspired leaks’ to the media, making wild allegations which are neither supported by any documentary proof, nor by the interrogation carried out so far, he claimed.
The same paper, ironically, also offers the correct usage (Larger conspiracy behind war room leak: George; Hindustan Times; June 24, 2006):
"We had charged the UPA Government of mounting a massive cover-up operation in these two cases, but we did not get any satisfactory answer from the Government," he said.
The hyphen is not used when it is a phrasal verb. See this (Jail inmate murders rape convict; The Times of India; June 25, 2006):
Both the convicts were apparently hooked on to mandrax. They are also suspected to be homosexuals. Prison officials are trying to cover up the issue, claimed a convict, who was released on Saturday.
A Reuters story provides another example (Coming soon — mind-reading computers; Reuters; June 26, 2006):
"We are working with a big car company and they envision this being employed in cars within five years," Robinson said, adding that a camera could be built into the dashboard. Anyone who does not want to give away too much information about what they are feeling, he said, can just cover up the camera.
