Good afternoon.
Welcome to episode 3 of My First Job, the podcast.
Today we are speaking to Lalitha Iyer, who was principal correspondent at The Week magazine
and has had a long stint at eNadu.
She has written about everything from beauty to politics to wellness.
My name is Venu Gopal Nair and I am the host.
I am also CEO of Ideascape Communications, an agency into branding, advertising and design.
Journalism is not just about great writing or bringing a story alive.
It's about being able to walk into difficult situations, keep your cool and get people
to talk.
Journalists need to win their confidence and in a world where misinformation is rampant,
have respect for the truth and leave it to the reader or viewer to make their decisions.
A career in journalism isn't easy, but it can be exciting and rewarding in ways that
you cannot fathom at the beginning.
Lalitha also speaks about young people looking to break into the profession today need to
do and what not to do.
Over to Lalitha.
It's ironic that now I like to be a reporter and I think I'm on the wrong side of the
mic.
I'm feeling a little uncomfortable and never been on this side of the mic.
But having said that, the Times of India experience was fantastic in the sense everyone's very
kind, extremely, you know, gentle and so on.
But they sent me on some foreign beat about some South Asian nation talk or some such.
I didn't understand a word of it and that time I was way too fresh in it.
I didn't know I had to do homework.
So I was kind of lost and out of it.
And the next next reporting assignment was a cricket match.
And I never really I'm not really fond of cricket.
Many people hate me for it.
So these two assignments really kind of, you know, gave me a feeling that I might not be
good at it.
And I continue to do little assignments, but I was not very happy.
When I went on the test, I got my first headline, you know, there were little claps and things
like that.
So that encouraged me.
Okay.
Then let's go back to school.
And what are the various things, career options that you considered or college at that point?
You know, there was really not too much because those days if I, if you did MA literature,
it was either you become a lecturer and, you know, get into journalism was never an option
really.
You become a lecturer because I had a cousin who was a lecturer.
She was quite the idol.
The other was my mother wanted me to join the bank for various other reasons.
And but I never appeared for the exam.
So till quite some time, she really accepted the fact that journalism was a field.
She says you should have joined the bank.
Why did you join journalism?
But yeah, but those were exciting times.
There are always things that parents themselves want to do and hope that children will learn
from them.
Seriously, seriously.
My mom was a teacher though, so she would have maybe liked me be a lecturer.
But after the times of India, still it, all other options just kind of naturally turned
off and I turned towards journalism.
In school and college?
I was a very good, I mean, extremely good student.
So yes, for, I mean, you have to write papers for MA and stuff like that.
Teachers would look up to me for presentations and you know, things like that.
I stood third in the university, which is not saying much, but I was a writer, but I
used to write poetry as a little hobby or something, but nothing great.
I mean, I would have never ever imagined me getting into journalism.
Never.
Yeah.
I think that's a little hang.
I did my stint in Times of India and then I decided to go to Bombay to do a film course,
which was an evening course at Sansevier's College.
Film course.
And you wouldn't believe it.
I wanted to do animation.
That was another favorite because I liked Tom and Jerry.
So I thought animation was the way out.
I could watch it every day and how stupid I was.
But I applied for a couple of universities, didn't get it.
Then I went to do this film course, which was an evening course.
Now I had to pay, you know, for the hostilities like that and there was no money.
I had just paid the fee.
So at that time there was this offer for working at Body and Beauty Care.
I don't know if you guys remember it, but this was the upside down magazine.
Dr. Padam Singh V.
I remember the upside down magazine thing.
Upside down.
Your body would be this side and when you turned, beauty would be on the other side.
So all stopped.
What is the logic there?
He just thought it was unique.
It did very well for some time.
Sheer curiosity value.
I did a lot of good work.
I mean, a lot of interviews, a lot of good work.
I didn't know a thing about beauty, but I did a lot of good work.
I did a lot of good work.
I mean, a lot of interviews, a lot of good work.
I didn't know a thing about beauty, but I did a lot of good work.
I didn't know a thing about beauty, but it was interesting and didn't know a thing about
medicine, but you kind of met people and you know, then you realize journalism is all about
homework and getting to like the subject as you go.
If you are, you know, good enough, you do your homework when you are meeting a good
doctor, you need to know what neurosurgery is about and then you go and talk to him.
So that was learnt on the job that when…
So how would you prepare for these interviews?
For any, even till for the week magazine, if I had to interview a business person, I
would read up everything that was, everything and then write out my questions and talk to
a couple of people if I knew them and that was homework.
So what did you find had changed about the interviews?
Was it easier to get people to talk?
See, I'm this side of the mic, but honestly, if I had interviewed you, you would have loved
it.
I am very comfortable talking and that is a requirement.
The requirement of a good journalist is to be friendly, to be able to listen even as
you ask questions and you know, button, I use the word very little, button at the right
time and you know, get back to the person so that you get insights.
And then how would you translate this into a report later?
Let's say you want to write an article, you make notes, there is a process.
But I think there is always this whole thing of I make a note, I remember parts of the
conversation, but getting all that together in a form that flows is a job.
I think most journalists, if you talk to them, they will say, it's the intro, the first few
lines that you need, the moment that falls into place, everything else falls in and typically
in an interview, you would introduce the person.
So it depends on how well you know the person.
Whereas if it's a report, it is, you know, political report, it would be something else.
You talk about the politics of the region, even a nationalism, you talk about a little
bit about history.
So given the situation, you change your intro, but the first few lines and you're on it because
you've done enough work already.
Okay.
One of the problems that I've found is that people who get into a job don't know what
they're letting themselves in for.
Yes.
They, you know, they learn on the job, but to a large extent, they are unaware of what
they're going to be walking into or what the early stages of the job will be.
Your experience will be invaluable on that.
So okay, you finish the interview, come back and then you start writing.
So how long would this process take?
No, no, typically, oh, if you're in a newspaper, it is like, you don't even get an hour depending
on when you finish it.
Right.
If you are for a week, for a person who was for 23 years in the week magazine, it, mine
was a relaxed job because I could finish reporting and send the report after 48 hours.
And then they carry the story after three weeks, so I could work on it.
So that was not any, but if you're a newspaper person, your report has to be immediate, almost
practically.
If there is a press conference happening at 5.30, sometimes there's an embargo, but sometimes
they say report it immediately.
So you would have to do it within, if you have to go for the first edition, it would
have been, it should be closed by 8 p.m.
If it is the second edition, then you're allowed till 11 p.m. and so on.
It is a knack to write a report, it is because you're already prepared when you're on the
job, you're preparing your intro.
Then, and of course, you discuss with the other colleagues and say, hey, shall I take,
shall we all take this?
You really don't want to go wrong there, right?
Because all the other newspapers are taking another lead and you go on and on.
So there is a lot of friendship happening there and you kind of say, we'll take the
same lead.
And then it depends on how well you report it, whether your report stands up or the others.
So there are, by and large, it's much discussed.
Okay.
That is, but now after television has come, there are a lot of people looking to that
and think there's immediate publicity, there's immediate thing happening or you become very
popular.
We didn't have this, we had print.
So there was a lot of mulling around.
Now it is, you know, visual, you can see the person, you can, you know, take a lead on
that and you say, okay, if I come on stage like this, I'll become popular.
So there is a lot to think about that in terms of coverage.
Yeah.
So you've actually spanned three massive changes.
You started from press, you saw the change into television and from television into digital.
Yes.
Right.
So working in a, okay.
So why don't we go this at this step by step?
Then you used news time.
What is the next, you started working at an Enadu system publication.
Yeah.
System publication, news time for five years.
I was, even as a, but here I must tell you a couple of anecdotes because it's very exciting
times then.
I was working on the magazine section, which would come every Sunday and I had a lot of
people reporting for me and I had a little column called Lolly VD column.
I would write a little column for kids on a comic page, extremely popular.
Everybody really got extremely envious because a lot of letters were coming in.
Then one point day when someone said, oh, but Lalitha, you know, you're not on the mainstream.
So I went to the boss and said, put me mainstream.
So he made me business.
He asked me to write some business.
Then everyone said, oh, but you're on the business side.
You said not me, right?
You're not covering politics.
So I went and told him, boss, I need to do politics because I'm sick and tired.
You wouldn't believe it.
It was election time.
I was standing there 5.30, I went and complained to him.
6.30, he said, book your ticket.
You're going to Patna to cover Vihar politics.
And I was like, oh my God, seriously?
I was shocked beyond wits, but I had a fantastic time covering it.
And I had a coup because I could do Laliprasad Yadav and it was carried in a very big way
on the op-ed page.
So I had a lot of stories then and stuff like that.
So what is it like actually being, you know, at the questioning end of these extremely
popular politicians?
Quite often, very nice.
Most often, in fact.
And incidentally, I was Chandrababu Naidu, one of the persons who got appointments quite
often.
But including him, election time when they are campaigning, if you're not on the campaign
with them, they can make you wait long.
So I did an interview with him at 3 a.m. in the morning once and I was waiting in an AC
comforter, you know, dinner and coffee and stuff like that.
They make you wait.
They make you wait a lot.
And this is where you learn your patience.
And if you think you're getting a scoop or if the interview is very important, you wait.
But for a daily reporter, that's, you know, it depends if he needs to get the interview
or not.
So depending on if you're working for a newspaper or for a magazine, you decide.
Okay.
But by and large, politicians are nice.
They are not.
They have not been.
Right.
And I've heard this from somebody who used to work at Business India saying that far
better than advertising.
I think politicians are great communicators because they are amazingly good at explaining
things.
They are very good at simplifying things.
You can also say that they are very good at manipulating.
But then the whole point is that they've got a point of view.
But have you found that it's true across most politicians that you met that they are very
clear about their concepts?
They Yes, they are because they want your vote.
Right.
Whether you are, you know, an English journalist or not.
But having said that, again, I'm bringing back Chandrababu Naidu.
Thanks to Babu, thanks to Naidu, politics became savvy.
They understood what was local coverage and what was national coverage.
So when they spoke with us, they spoke with a little more difference because they knew
the audience was wider.
Earlier, that was not there.
Right.
But they were quite localized and they would probably not talk English.
They would speak the local language and stuff like that.
But somehow I have a feeling that Naidu has changed a little in terms of political aspects.
So and in terms of, you know, news awareness also, they began to realize.
Television also coming full force at that time.
So they began to realize that local news is something else and this was.
So when you're talking to a seasoned politician who's been in Delhi for some time, he is
extremely, he will speak extremely well with you.
You know, totally take you astray from the question you asked him, but still speak so
well.
So you kind of have to bring it back.
Yeah.
Sometimes you don't even realize they counter you or taking you in the other direction.
Yeah, take me somewhere else and then you have to tell him, sorry, but you know, come
back.
Okay.
So you have to be a little on a one on one level.
Sometimes at a press conference, you know, you get enough information from the questions
being asked.
So you kind of cover that.
So.
But were you at any point thinking, like you said, okay, you've gotten into journalism.
It had already been five, six years since you spent.
Yeah.
Did you ever have any thoughts about saying, should I explore something else which is related
to writing or life was so interesting that you didn't really have the time to?
Absolutely.
Life was too interesting and I got an offer, two offers for television, but I was, because
somehow you, I relish the fact that I can work on a story rather than, much though it's
nice and for immediacy, I prefer to really do a little sit back on it, dwell upon and
write.
And so I prefer to print you.
Now people might call it a bit lazy, but it wasn't, you know, it was just that you could
add that much.
And so I refused the TV jobs and now fairly late in life, I think of films.
Now.
No, but it's great that you're still looking at this whole thing and saying, okay, there
are new dimensions that you'd like to explore.
Yes.
Yeah.
You've obviously seen whole new generations of reporters come in.
So one of the things which you mentioned early on is that the newcomers probably want to
be on TV much earlier.
And they understand that TV can be a ticket to far better visibility, possibly career
advancement early on.
But what do you think are things that they need to develop once they're in the business?
I think ultimately, even in journalism, in as in any other, it's hard work, right?
You have to be at it.
And quite often local media, in regional media, especially when a woman comes into journalism
or something, she's sent to women and child welfare invariably for some reason, right?
The woman, I just tell girls, take it up.
You can do some phenomenally interesting stories.
And it's over a period of time that these kinds of stories have really hit, you know,
hit home.
And the people, they're like Better India and a couple of other people who are focusing
on these kinds of stories.
So there is journalism out there, which talks of developmental studies, which talks of women,
which talks of welfare, welfare issues and things like that.
Like I said, every young girl or boy, they think politics is, is it when you talk of
journalism, they think they need to do politics.
Whereas I think politics, you know, the guy moves away after five years, and he'll make
some stupid policy decision doesn't matter.
You need to be where, where people are happy, where people have had an impact, somebody
else has done some work.
So there's a lot of, lot of, of course, many people will differ with me on this.
But I think when a youngster gets into television, they must think much beyond politics is what
I think.
There's a, there's a huge world out there.
There's entertainment, there's development, there's rural welfare, and there is all kinds
of, in our time there was nationalism.
Now unfortunately it's not there.
Oops, it's, you know, kind of slowly, I cannot say unfortunate, but it's kind of ebbing.
But those are exciting because you knew the police, you knew the Naxals, and you could
cover that and you could give your perspective.
I mean, fantastic, fantastic.
So tell me what, what is it like to meet, get two completely different points of view.
For example, when you meet the Naxals and you talk to them, you get one point of view.
And then when you talk to the police, you get the exact opposite point of view.
So in your mind, how are you reconciling these two truths, but seen from a completely different
perspective?
You know, at heart, I think all of us, I mean, we are all leftists at a certain level.
Okay.
I mean, so deep inside, what the guy is doing is right.
There is a vigilante in all of us, right, at a certain level.
But having said that, when you, after you meet the Naxals, you kind of, you know, you,
the police, very friendly of course, but they kind of become wary of you.
You know, they say, ah, you went and met them, you spent time with them, so, you know, what
is the use, why should we tell you anything.
But having said that, in Andhra, there was a lot of activity, proactive kind of towards
and so, I mean, YSR did that and therefore, it took this part where, you know, they had
to surrender arms and things like that.
But we've had some tremendous people who have done fantastic work with and we've had several
activists who've done phenomenal work with Naxals, you know, going to grassroot level.
So both the aspects, but depends on you, you never write one story, you write several stories.
So you get the Naxal point of view and then you get the police point of view.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking.
That's totally where.
It's, it's almost as if you get both.
You, you talk to doctors, you talk to patients and that is where you see this multiplicity
of perspectives.
People who tend to be in one job tend to know about one thing because they develop a lot
of specialized knowledge.
You know about television, you can never get perspective.
It's always one sided.
It's my feeling unless you, it's, it's, you know, a developing story, then you give perspective.
But in print, you, you can do it.
You can do justice to both the areas of what I'm.
Okay.
In your mind, where is the change happening in the profession, in your own life?
How do you think things changed as you spent more years in it?
I'm, I think during my time or people of my seniority, we traveled to the place.
Okay.
We traveled to the place, touched the place, smelted and wrote stories.
Now that is not a necessity.
And I think that's criminal, that's criminal.
You will never ever get the true aura story.
And then never, never the truth.
If you don't travel, you will never get what actually happened.
We might have, we, we'll go there after the crime has happened, but you see the area,
you wonder, you think, how did it happen?
You know, and you develop a story on that.
That is no more an essay.
And I think that's really stepping backwards in time.
So how is it handled now?
You're the, the travel is cut down.
You can call, pandemic especially helped, pandemic helped, right?
You just called people and said, what happened?
Tell us.
And that's it.
Yeah.
Which is such a tragedy.
So that's almost like building a story from here, say.
Any, anyone can write, anyone can write.
You don't need to go there.
You don't need to sniff the air and say, how did it happen?
We had a very famous police officer who got shot at the junction of the city and the Naxals
escaped, four of them, they had escaped.
Some of us went there and spent three days, you know, how did it happen?
How could it ever happen?
And then it all kind of fell into, and again, just to say, the Naxals had done their homework.
They done recce trips so often that they, they had it packed, right?
Whoa.
And this is what we tell the police, that the Naxals do their homework.
You guys don't do and we become enemies.
Plus they have the advantage of surprise because they are planning.
Exactly.
They planned it.
Yeah.
And they don't know, whereas the police would not know that this particular thing is happening
there.
Exactly.
One of the changes that Chandrababu Naidu brought about was the way he modified what
he said to a local journalist or what he talked about on the national stage versus what he
spoke on the regional stage.
I think Hyderabad also focused on infrastructure because it was one of the cities where you
began to see a whole lot of change.
Okay.
All those little stories are like drops that add up to the overall picture of what is changing.
Absolutely.
Clinton came.
The top story when Clinton had come, he invited, you know, inaugurate the place was Clinton
got a license in two hours, right?
Okay.
We got him a license and that was high tech.
And we all wrote about it.
But a few of us, it was that Clinton got his own vehicle and he, it was a Humvee.
So we all stood at the gate to see the Humvee go and worshipfully looked at the Humvee and
like, Oh, hopefully Clinton would look at us, wave to us and say, come get it.
I'll take you for a ride.
Never happened.
But these are the things.
Babu introduced us to a world perspective.
A lot of foreigners came, Bill Clinton came and the Microsoft guy came.
All these people came and we could, we could meet them.
We could talk with them and things, things turned dramatic.
And suddenly Andhra was, Hyderabad was at the center of things and we got a lot of attention.
Journalists as journalists, we got a lot of attention nationally.
It was no more South India.
It was Hyderabad.
That happened.
Okay.
So what was it like producing magazine?
You did for almost five years, you said.
Yes.
So Body and Beauty Care, I worked, did a lot of good work.
We came up with a magazine called Body Care and the editor didn't know a thing about what
was happening.
She just brought it out.
She said, you'd like to produce it with pleasure.
And I had a couple of people to help and I went and got the first copy, right from the
print, from the machine.
It was a solid black cover and I took it in my hand and all the ink got stuck to my hand,
but I loved it.
The smell of ink, the first issue.
It was like having a new baby in your hands.
It was phenomenal.
I can still smell the ink.
Even in Times of India, Times of India then the letterpress.
So you go and stand with a guy and tell him, ye karo, woh karo, you know, those are then
those guys are so happy that the person was talking.
And then we had the cut and paste in Newstime.
So I grew from there, you know, software where you can sit on the computer and change it.
You can edit it.
It continued on page three.
There we'd have to stand and see that it is continued on page here.
You can on the computer itself.
So huge improvement there.
But of course, once you are a reporter, you're never then you become only a reporter.
So since you were on the inside, what did you think were the changes that digital really
brought about?
So you had this overnight thing, newspapers you would read the next morning.
Today it's breaking news every five minutes.
It's almost as if by the time the newspaper comes out, all that news has already been
discussed, tweeted.
Yes, everyone's gone online also when we've all gone.
No, no, we used to have an online edition where we wrote every at six o'clock in the
whatever is happening during the day, we would have to report if it was very interesting.
So we would have to rush to a point, get some story, come back and cover it.
So that was also extremely exciting.
And you also had to send them story ideas for online, which wouldn't get carried in
the print because that took a week.
So if there was something very interesting, you do it online.
We had we also experienced the immediacy of it.
So we had to come before the newspaper really.
Week magazine, of course, was a week old.
But in this case, we have to come before Deccan Chronicle hit my little basket out there.
So we had to do that.
So that was also exciting.
But it kind of really jolted you off because you really have to be so quick, so quick.
You've been on so many beats, political beauty, naxals.
How do you out of these, which are the points that really stand out?
Obviously, Chandrababu Naidu's, but from let's say some of the other stories, which are the
ones that you still recall so many years later?
Naxalism because I was among the first women.
See this is another thing when because I was in Hyderabad, right, there were only three
women reporters, three women reporters.
I was one among them.
So it was it was a unique experience for us to go out there and get story.
All of us were working with papers, but it was different.
And I learned the language on the job.
And now I can speak very fluent Telugu.
I learned it on the job.
So it was an experience to go there and get a source, translate the thing and, you know,
get the work done.
When you're talking to people in their own language, what is it that you're looking for?
Are you simply asking them questions based on what the incident is or in your mind, you're
trying to get a feel of what their life is like so that that becomes the background texture
of the story?
Actually, I am among it during my stint in The Week, I did a lot, covered a lot of naxalism.
I covered a lot of Dalit, Dalit text.
Andhra was the hub of a lot of, you know, acts against negative acts against Dalit.s
And I had a very dear friend who was a Dalit reporter.
And so it became a kind of, you know, we both helped one another.
I could travel wherever I was.
And he had all the experience and the information which we needed.
So both of us would cover it.
He'd cover for a newspaper and I'd write for it.
That's something that, you know, like you said, if it can be accomplished on a phone,
then people think that, oh, it's fine.
Which I think is one of the problems of living in a virtual environment practically all the
time.
But I will, I will pack my very positive on that.
I was at the ground.
You're completely at the same.
And my last contacts, currently they're alive.
And I traveled.
I don't think any other person, any other reporter who was in Hyderabad has ever done
so.
So I can say that with great pride.
I have traveled a lot, extensively.
So would you say that at some point your family was, I hate to use the word, accommodating
your parents were, you know, they didn't have a point of view on this.
In a way, yes, I didn't, I didn't have children.
So that was a huge, huge advantage because schooling and stuff like that was never a
problem.
I had my parents and I was a bit sick for some time.
But like I said, travel was easy because I cook and go and I had little and then my father
stayed with me for long and he fell ill only towards the end.
And by which time I had, I was not a working job.
I was not reporting as such.
I was working.
I was not reporting as such.
So it helped.
In my case, everything fell into place.
Seriously, I mean, no complaints at all in that area.
Does being a woman make your perspective different?
For example, when you meet Dalit?
Yes and no, because we are not looking at a Dalit problem from the at all.
You look at it as a overall issue.
And because the more we, I think we are probably that much more sensitive undeniably, but when
you are really writing for a newspaper that doesn't come across, it depends on how you
present the problem.
And probably my story is a slightly more human interest and more human value than others,
definitely.
But I do not know if that was because I was or just that I was more interested at the
grassroot level with these, therefore.
Right.
See a local reporter from that village covering that story would be entirely different from
a person who's read a little bit more and goes there and covers the story.
I think that is what brought in.
Right.
You know, your approach.
So I think the man was covering that same story, he probably would meet the men, but
not necessarily the women from within because of the various social things which are there
or that doesn't matter.
I was telling you this person, both helped on his stories.
He's written a little book on that.
His stories are superb in local language, sheer poetry.
Unfortunately, we could, our coverage could never be poetry because we were not allowed
to write so long, such long stories.
But it was sheer poetry.
He covered it also there.
But there are certain issues like when you cover national, our perspective is entirely
different from a male perspective.
Definitely.
Yeah.
Okay.
How did you manage your sources?
Locating a source or you said you're still in touch with some of them.
So what exactly, how do sources get built?
I think that's the larger question and how do you manage them over a career?
See basically sources in politics is you kind of keep meeting.
Yeah.
So here I will tell you the brotherhood is very strong, extremely strong.
So if a male journalist goes, arm goes across the shoulder and hey, hey, they're cracking
jokes and they're talking and he's on the phone, they get immediate contact.
We have to do that much more hard work.
Even with a woman quality, we would have to do that much more hard work than a male quality
for some reason.
I would like to say a lot but not as to why that happens.
That a woman has to work harder at developing her source, quality and whereas other business
sources you might get, you might be able to get one on one, talk to them and doesn't
matter.
Police also, I managed a few very good sources but very difficult for a woman to cross that
barrier.
Breakthrough.
Yeah, cross that barrier, very difficult and it's a lot of hard work.
I mean, real, you have to do PR, you know, call them up, how's life, how are you, can
I come and visit you?
So I was doing unnecessary visits out of town just to keep in touch with the police so that
he would tell me.
We did all this because it was natural times, therefore, because I want to know immediate
news about when something happens.
Otherwise, I suppose you call them up and I used to know every single, there were 13
districts, I used to know the SP of every single, every single district.
I knew the SP, the DSP, the AC, you name them, I knew them.
I know their numbers.
Very well connected there.
Exactly.
Yes.
Yeah.
Is there a way to differentiate this or this is really a personal judgment?
No, no, of course, you could code and an axel is unfortunate.
Again, I use the word no more on the ground.
But yeah, you could differentiate who was an axel and who was not.
Again, I had my team, which would, you know, when we went, we went to the genuine person.
Okay.
Again, it took a lot of hard work, a lot of looking across over the shoulder, a lot of
secrecy, a lot of phone calls, don't call me now, call me later.
Those days it was, you know, dial your number.
So it was a lot of hard work, but we had a genuine source.
Okay.
How did you manage the tensions?
Because it was obviously not easy, especially the deadline of catching a story or, you know,
getting through to these people, getting them to trust you, figuring out there were points
when maybe…
Trust was not sad.
Trust was never an issue, Benu.
Trust was never an issue.
But again, people are genuine when probably here being a woman, and invariably by the
way, when you go to any place, rural, any place new, you take the local person.
So your rapport with the local is very, and you have to build it up and therefore it happened.
But trust was never an issue.
Okay.
And then let's say, did you ever have a conflict about a story that, you know, you knew would
be great to break, but you either were told that this is off the record and I guess it
must be happening very often.
Always.
So the best news never gets published or the worst?
Never.
Yeah.
Believe it.
We will find more details and then we will publish it.
Always.
And you know, you work on it, you wait for the introduction to come and you're spending
hours on end, you don't sleep the night and you think you've got a fantastic intro, the
blighter will put it right at the end of this, what you thought was a brilliant intro would
come as a conclusion of the story.
But that is the job of, the magazine has to look as the magazine looks.
That's the part of the desk job there.
Yeah.
But yeah.
So is there a tension between the desk and the reporters?
The reporters?
Not really.
Not with the news magazine.
And even when I was on the desk at news time, we never had it.
Okay.
Only thing is the editor would of course check that the news was genuine.
If it was breaking news especially, so is the news genuine, go check it out again and
things like that.
But by and large, by and large the desk and they remain together.
Okay.
I mean these days they might be complex, those days they were not.
The right qualifications of the right temperament for being at the desk versus being a reporter,
how would you divide the two?
The reporters, the reporter always takes his capsules.
You can't ever change that.
He's like there, you know he'll walk in, sashay in, have a cigarette, those days cigarette
and you know and make a big thing and come and look at his story and say why don't you
change this.
He thinks his capsules are scarce, he, she, right.
Whereas the desk person is like, it is the desk person's story which really appears.
In the magazine, in the newspaper, in the magazine, in the newspaper probably not too
much of a change because the person really is giving last minute.
The English is changed, the grammar is changed.
In a magazine the entire story is, so it is really not your story, your byline is carried
but it is that person who's polished that story.
So there is a huge difference and reporters think they are a class apart.
They will not acknowledge the work desk person.
Whereas I think the desk person is like a diamond polish.
He brings the facets of the story.
Okay.
Is there a spirit of competition, rivalry between publications?
You're going after the same story or that is something that is part of the job and everyone
accepts it or?
Yeah.
If you're on a newspaper, you normally come to the press club after 11 p.m. when you put
the story to bed.
So you would come and you order your drink and you come and drink.
So there is no, not much of rivalry there.
Unless you're a television person.
Then these days at the press club there is a lot of, you know, there is breaking, but
again I said there is a chimeric.
I mean they would let you know that something is happening and that there is a break in
news.
So it happens.
Maybe the national versus local might have a bit of an issue.
But the local journalists all get together and they work at it.
Not an issue.
Like I said, we all carry a common lead.
I mean you cannot carry another lead and get your, you know, kind of, yeah.
You know, you passed out in arts and then you thought you would be a lecturer.
Today there are journalism colleges, there are courses.
Do you think that has made a difference?
There is the Asian College of Journalism.
I think the Hindu does it.
Oh, they think they are cats whiskers whiskers.
I mean we are and the people are given that kind of, it's like the IIM or the IID.
So the Asian School of Journalism is considered as that.
But ultimately if you are on the desk, you are giving a headline.
If you are on, if you are a reporter, you are writing reports.
I mean maybe your English is likely better than the rest.
But if you really do not have your contacts, do not have your grassroots support, if you
do not have enough happening around you, I mean how does it matter, right?
I would think, but then I am not from Asian School of Journalism, so I can afford to talk.
It's so true that the degree is useful up to the first job.
After that it really depends on what you do.
Ultimately it's your contact.
Nobody asks you.
If you want to be a reporter, yes.
Yeah, exactly.
You know, it's like guys who go and do a course abroad in filmmaking and then come back and
say, okay, where did you assist?
What did you do?
Yes, precisely.
You know, you see so many more movies, it's about all.
So did you have a mentor?
Do you feel that it's important in a job to have a mentor?
In journalism, no.
In any profession, but you obviously are into journalism because you feel that.
Yeah, no, no, and you don't need a mentor or depending.
For example, I must tell you this little story.
I joined a group called the Pandit Group Publication.
It brought out imprint.
There are two things I will always feel bad in life that I never worked for the imprint.
I think the best magazine, there's Caravan, which is again one of the best produced magazines
and there's the Indian Express, which I think is the, you know, honest newspaper.
I never worked in these three.
Imprint, I actually applied to imprint, but they didn't have A3 and so therefore I joined
there, they were coming out with a new magazine on sound and music and stuff like that.
But there was Weed Song Weed and there were like eight girls and they'll always be talking
and they'll always be talking and I, that is the one time I was extremely envious that
I was not part of a harem, right?
I mean like I felt very bad, very, very, but yes, at that time I'm entering hell because
they came out with some phenomenal stories, fantastic great stories and they worked so
much at it.
They were allowed a lot of freedom.
The Weak magazine also allowed, all our editors were our mentors.
I mean we would discuss it with them and you know, break the story and tell them these
are the various aspects.
They would help us through it.
I'm trying to understand how does the editor help you refine the story?
In the sense, does he change, he or she change the emphasis?
Do they change the order in which the story comes or does he say that certain aspects
of this have not been covered?
They would of course on a lot of that.
Okay.
And there's always this fight, if you're writing from grass root, they're asking you
weird questions, right?
Because they are sitting somewhere else and they're totally urban and they do not understand
where it's coming from.
So those kind of little clashes would happen but by and large the person who's editing
your story is with you through the story and the person understands you and would polish
the story and of course they would like I said change the introduction to conclusion
and bring the conclusion as introduction.
That is their privilege.
So you would but there are one or two reporters from the magazine whose story was never touched.
So that speaks a lot.
So how would you file stories way back when communication was nowhere near as good as
especially when you were going in the morning?
Oh exciting.
I covered a story for, I covered it through phone, through phone.
By the way, I was also reporting for Malayalam.
So by phone in a sense you were literally dictating the story?
They were dictating the story.
There was somebody who would take it because we were in the wilderness and there was only
one telephone available and I couldn't send the story.
But otherwise we would send the story through the telegraph office.
I can't even think about it.
Yeah we would go there and type and they would send it.
But that happened only for a year or two before we kind of became slightly computer savvy.
All the people in the week magazine had a Mac.
I never got used to a Mac.
It was always using Word.
No and I'm saying that's the other part, practically all the jobs we are talking about
today advertising agencies used to send CDs by courier and got into publication.
Most of the change has been for the good?
Yeah most.
It has been good because no it has been good one and I'm still traveling so I'm not envious
of anybody and no one else is traveling which is seriously the tragedy of this that no one
is going out there to cover a story.
They are sitting here and writing.
Of course there are correspondence but people are not traveling which is really a big setback.
So from what you say I think people who are trying to enter the profession should be doing
do a lot of travel into the interior areas, figure out what life is like, figure out if
you like doing it and then figure out if you like discomfort.
We are used to a lot of comfort these days so getting these stories obviously wasn't
a comfortable exercise by any means.
Not at all.
I once had to travel, climb a mountain and you know I looked at the mountain and said
come on Lalitha I can climb this.
Oh it was a bad experience.
I huffed and puffed and gave my bag to somebody, my water bottle to somebody and then I kind
of you know grabbed whatever was available and climbed up.
Those are the kind of stories we did and you know when it got published you could see the
sweat in it.
You could see the work you know in the set.
I felt it and then the local journalists or the local people say oh you went there and
you did this.
It was a nice feeling.
Yeah I think that's the point of authenticity because you give details that only if you
are on site you could have made out.
That is what I am saying.
There is no way that somebody who sort of had a distant view would have actually been
in.
No way.
You cannot.
That mountain experience no one can tell it unless you travel.
What about women in journalism?
There are obviously a lot more today than when you started out, but do you think it's
still skewed towards males or do you think it's more or less kind of.
No it's not.
It's no more skewed.
No more skewed.
Ok.
And women are right out there, absolutely out there, but like I said there is a here
we need to divide between English newspapers and local regional newspapers.
The local will not allow so the English newspapers have crossed that way beyond long back.
So we've had a lot more women reporters who've been writing so many so many good stories
and they've been doing so much more and Delhi especially way ahead.
South kind of took some time, but Delhi and some of the other place Bombay has been there,
but local journalism still kind of a little tad hesitant.
Yeah.
Ok.
Wow that's been quite a journey.
Where do you see this going out and looking at new things?
What are your interests now?
No just about everything.
I am I think currently currently I'm still objectivity right.
I write about food, I write about where I went, how I travelled, I write a little blog.
So I mean people read it and they like it and you know some of them I visit temples
so I'll write the journey to the temple and many people I realize appreciate the fact
when I point it out where they can get good food and where they can find clean toilets.
So that is a positive step.
No those are always the little details that matter.
It's one thing to say I watched a lovely sunset, but the sunset happens and then you have to
go back to your hotel, find food and all the other things which are there.
Wonderful so just to kind of summarize I think from the girl who won the debate competition
and started out at the Times of India to a beauty magazine and then met so many doctors
and practitioners there to Newsweek, I mean ENADO Newsline and the multiplicity of characters
that you've seen on every side of the fence from the politicians to the stars to the Naxals
to the police.
I think you've got to see a microcosm of the multiple perspectives that happen which I
think is unique to a journalist job.
So that's one thing which I think is you know in most other professions you get to see it
either from your point of view or from the other point of view and if you have a large
circle of friends you might get to see a little more perspective, but here it's on the job.
In conclusion is there anything that you would like to tell young people who are looking
at getting into this?
Don't say no to any assignment and work hard.
Don't say no to any assignment.
There is no, there is no law.
There is no I will not cover welfare, I'll only do no.
Every area, every subject has depth.
We can always look.
So don't say no to any subject.
Just you're given an assignment, do it with your heart and hard work pays always.
And you're an example of that.
Lalitha Iyer, thank you very much for the time that you've spent.
I think it was really interesting to see how your journey started and how it continues.
Here's wishing you continued writing and new explorations in future.
Thank you for being on the show.
Entirely my pleasure.
Thank you so much for inviting me.
Thank you very much.
Good afternoon.