My long lost but recently reconnected friend Mohan Deep from my Bombay days has paid me a compliment that I have a sweet disposition and my writing is sugary. Yes these days, I am bitten by a positivism bug. But this compliment made me to have a second look at my life and I was shocked to recollect the sad, painful and tragic moments.
I was the eldest son a lower middle class business family from Chandni Chowk. My grandfather had migrated from Bhiwani, Haryana in 1918. He was illiterate but worldly wise and enterprising. Soon he approached a renowned oil producing mill Ahmed Oomerbhoy and became its sole selling agent. His job was to sell 660-tin railway wagon of mustard oil brand Postman and vegetable oil Oomda. He got two annas per tin of those days equivalent to 12 paisas of today. I was very close to him. He was a quintessential pilgrim and took the entire family to Garh Muktteshway, Vrindavan and Haridwar frequently. He was a devout follower of Lord Krishna and I still remember his image of holding the string of Krishna's swing and bathing him every morning. His painful death after a prolonged old age illness was the first tragedy of my life which is still etched in my memory. I could never form such a bondage with any other member of my family.
There is nothing to write back home about my school days. I was just not interested in classroom teacher. I had not known that I was inadvertently following the footsteps of Tagore who was a school dropout and instead wrote poems under a tree which earned him a Noble prize for his Geetanjali. I didn't write any poetry because I was more tuned in to prose. Courtesy English cricket commentary and radio news as well as plays, I picked up lot of words and phrases to survive in my spoken English but my formal learning was so bad that I got a compartment in English. It was my first failure and the second tragedy.
I turned out to be a hopeless students of mathematics which was inadvertently forced upon me. The result was inevitable. I failed thrice before I became the first graduate in my entire extended family from both paternal and maternal side. My friends and family had written me off as a lost case. My father sought divine convention. As such he was a die-hard ritualistic Hindu believer. He took me every evening to Hanuman temple opposite Nigambodh cremation Ghat at the banks of Yamuna. It was an ordeal. One day, I promised to Hanuman, that if he would help me to become a graduate, I would never return to him in life. He heard me. I became a graduate and never went to a Hanuman temple again. I didn't have any idea what I would do in my life. My father wanted me to be a bank clerk. I tried but failed. It was my third tragedy.
During college days, a producer of All India Radio R.K.Maheshwari was a judge at Sriram College. he gave me a first prize for my language and arguments against Sanskaratised Hindi and called me to see him in his office. I did and became a radio broadcaster on current affairs. During one of the visits there, I met Kumud Nagar, drama producer who asked me to write a play Ek Dayra Toota sa which was based on my own love story. It made me a radio playwright and I have two anthologies to my credit. But as a graduate, I found my future aimless and directionless. My father wanted me to be a bank clerk. I tried but failed. That was my fourth tragedy.
One evening I heard an agency editor Baleshwar Aggarwal inviting yout5h who had vision, perspective, fire in the belly and ambition to join his organization. Next day, I was in his office at Mandi House where Doordarshan has its headquarters today and wrote that I was visionary, fire in my belley and ambitious. Would you give me a job? He came out of his office, hugged me with a hard on in his trousers and offered me a job. I became a Hindi journalist. But I was fired for non-performance in less than three months. That was my fifth tragedy.
But, I had befriended an experienced news editor Sharad Dwivedi who in that agency who took me with him whyen he left for another agency Samachar Bharati. There its editor, asked me if I had played sports. I had played cricket but in my street with a wooden ball. I told him, I was in my college football team. He hired me as a trainee reporter at fifty rupees. In those days, I had a girl friend who was head over heels in our relationship. Our relationship had continued for five years. But one day, her family chose an army major for her. She bid me good bye. That was my sixth tragedy.
Soon I left Samchar Bharati to become an English sports reporter in Motherland newspaper. I had a boss Roshan Lal Sethi whose English betrayed that his Punjabi must be better. He had crammed English phrases for all the sports terms and he would make sentences out of them like a parrot. I foundit humiliating. He was equally disgusted me and I returned to Hindi in the next door Sarita magazine. That was my seventh tragedy.
But Sarita was not that bad. The editor sent time to Jullundur to cover the closure of Punjab Kesari newspaper by the then chief minister Pratap Singh Kairon for writing agai8nst his government. I interviewed Lala Jagat Narain and his son Ramesh Chander. Both were latter shot dead by Sikh terrorists. I interviewed people in authority like Lt Governor vijar Kapoor, Gautam Kaul etc. But soon, I was bored with the ambience in the office and the nature of the job. I resigned. That was my eighth tragedy.
Bot a break in Indian Express weekly Aaspas was a blessing in disguise. I brought my next girl friend late Reeta Dutta Gupta. She was snooty but it boosted my ego that such a touch me not indulged. Aaspas exposed me to celebrities like Mukesh, Satyajit Roy, Sultan Ahmed of Chambal ki Kasam. I was the film editor of the weekly. Manglesh Dabral, Anupam Mishra, Jayant Mehta, Shrawan Garg and Udyan Sharma were my colleagues. But the paper folded up in six months because, there were no ads in it. It was ninth tragedy.
Media was hip and happening in those days. came 1975 emergency and the four agencies were united to form Samachar. I was the first employee under k.P. Srivastava. But again as a sports reporter. I covered the funeral of the Indian president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed. And also Kanpur Test Match against England. The going was great but not my luck. Samachar was disbanded by the next government. That was tenth tragedy.
Status quo ante was restored. samachar Bharati was revived and so was my job but now as a political correspondent. I was sent to cover a Congress session. There I hosted a liberal part over drinks. to fellow journalist. The media dvisor nemi Sharam Mittal reported it my office. I was transferred to South India because I knew how to speak English. That was 11th tragedy.
I went with Rajiv Pandey, now the editor of Univarta and had a whale of time. I came to know all the four southern states. But returned without informing office and started phone stories after reading Hindu about that region. A peon caught me having golgappas at Bengali market and told the office. I came to know about it and resigned. That was 12th tragedy.
Next day, I approached the bureau chief of Onlooker D.M.Silveria and narrated my sobstory that I was a Hindi journalist but punished because I knew English. He said forget your Hindi and English and tell me do you know what is news, where do you get it and can you uncomfortable questions. I said yes to all of them. He hired me then and there and I became an investigative reporter in the true sense of the world. Next room was of ABP where M.J.Akbar used to come and sit when he was in Delhi. Soon Silvera shaped into a firebrand. One instance. He asked met talk to five top leaders of five parties and speak to them on and off the record. I followed his instructions. When he came back he asked me to report both the ver4sions and published them as it is. It created a furor but I had hit the ceiling. 13th tragedy.
This success caught the attention of India Today editor Aroon Piurie. He phoned me and asked to see him the next day. I asked Silvera what to do. He said go and join. I said why, because I know you can't deny and I won't stop you. That was the biggest tragedy of my life. I joined it IT next day. The prized assignment was to interview the dreaded terrorist on the Punjab highway near Amritsar. My magnum opus in journalism. But I lasted only for five days and five months because I got an offer of editorship of a film magazine Super from the owner Rajiv Gokhale. I was surprised why a film magazine would hire a political reporter. I wish they had not. I joined them. It was confusion worst confounded. 14th mishap.
I flew to Bombay but lasted only for seven days and seven months. It was a disaster. I was not cut out for gossip journalism. I made a fool of myself and the magazine. Gokhale turned it into a weekly because he thought ads will multiply four times. That arithmetic's didn't work. The magazine folded up. So did my Bombay dream,. 15th undoing.
I came by third class in Dehradoon Express to be the senior editor of Caravan magazine. My second innings there. This time in English. I was directly reporting to the owner editor Lala Vishwa Nath,te Gandhian media baron. I wrote a nasty piece of infighting between the president Zail Singh and Punjab CM Darbara Singh with a cover headline Singh vs Singh. It was a laid back job. Durng this job I got an offer to be associated with the mega soap opera Hum Log. Lalaji came to know about it and he sacked me. The first sacking of my life.16th let down.
I worked there for a year and a half. Then produced my own serial Purvaee. I made Rs 26 laks from the sponsor Richardson Hindustan. But frittered away this money, the way it came. 17th but the worst mismanagement.
I don't how jobs kept on coming my way without asking for it. The next was Midday. I succeded Adarsha Kumar Varma as its news editor. It was edited at that time by theowner Khalid Ansar. He called me to Bombay and stayed at the Gympkhana. Editing a daily afternoon tabloid in Delhi was a great job. I felt like a satrap of the national capital. I rubbed many people on the wrong side including Indian prime minister V.P. Singh. I was asked to interview him by his office. But after six months, I found the editor's job very taxing. It was 18th admission of giving up half way.
A new editor Anil Dharkar had joined in. He sent me to Mauritius. as the correspondent of the parent Bombay edition. He again called me to Bombay and we had great time. I interacted with his poetess wife Imtiaz Dharkar. I was in the company of Bombay celebrities but the paper was not giving me any kick.I returned to Hindi journalism as Bureau Chief of Swatantra Bharat, of Pioneer Group. Vinod Mehta was Pioneer editor.19th calling it a day in a row.
Swatantra Bharat was a powerful paper. I was covering BJP. Visted the whole of India. I started a colun in Mid-day Diplomacy. It connected to the diplomatiuc cocktail circuit. It gave me an idea to start my own magazine Indo-Latin American File. I was hobnobbing with Latin ambassadors. My profile went up. I got an invite from Rashtrapati Bhawan to accompany Shankar Dayal Sharma to Latin America. It hurt editor's ego. He sought my resignation. I risgned and went in the trip. 20th professional hara-kiri.
The magazine continues. The same editor called me again to join Times group as its Hindi bureau chief for a Sunday weekly Dinman Times. I was sent to Pakistan. Visisted Hira Mandi and PoK. But the paper didn't last. It was not economically viable. I became a victim of corporate warfare. 21st and the last Greek tragedy of my checkered life.
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