MY BREATH stopped, my heart raced, sweat trickled down my forehead and I finally said, “Sir, I’m Nandagopal Rajan from Calicut in Kerala.” Life can be hard for a 20-year-old, who stutters and stammers his way through all sentences.
“So, Nandagopal, where will you go? What about Ranchi,” the senior editor from The Hindustan Times asked. This was my dream job, but a debut in Bihar was not exactly what I’d dreamt of. I glanced back with my best you-know-why look and blurted out: “Sir, send me anywhere…except Bihar.”
Contrary to my fears, there was a knowing smile on the editor’s face. “Well then, go to Chandigarh,” he said, jotting the city on my CV. My campus selection was over.
Less than a month later, I found myself staring at the designer, who’d come from Delhi for the launch, trying my best to explain why I’d given a headline which went ‘Let me die here’ in 50 pt size on a dummy page. I tried to reason that this was exactly what I felt about my job—die working on the desk, like my grandfather. But all they could do was laugh at this wiry young trainee staff-writer. (Well, I was wiry then.)
Many webs of newsprint have been inked since that sultry summer afternoon seven years ago. After six years in Punjab--where I courted my first crush (journalism), then fell in love and got married to a girl who too loved this job--I finally managed to jump out of the frying pan into the fire of the Capital’s news scene. After all, this was where I was headed when I left home with the telegram from IIMC, Dhenkanal.
My second job in The Indian Express promised much, a foothold in Delhi--the place where all news is made--an opportunity to be amidst the real action and the chance to interact with the stalwarts in the field. I was sure I’d done all I could in City Beautiful, it was time to move on.
I was finally subbing copies of reporters who’ve worked more years than me and had bid farewell to my staple of “Two die in road mishap,” and “Paramour kills husband” stories.
The parents were happy too. Finally, their son was where he ought to have been. “After all what was he doing in Chandigarh?” To quote a journalist friend from my hometown, “Maybe, in your rush to reach Delhi, you slipped and ended up in Punjab.”
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