The
Story of Newsday
By A. Hariharan
In 1982, a twenty-two
year- old kerosene stove is still hissing away in the verandah next to my
study. It is now used exclusively for cooking Terry’s ( the female Alsatian
inmate of the house) meat. But in 1960, this stove was used to melt the used
lino metal from the pages of Newsday,
again to be plunged into the pots of two vintage linotype machines. The stove
is the only souvenir now left with me of that adventure so many of us shared
for a short 10 months in 1960.
When I left The Free Press Journal, I did not have
the professional status or social standing of S. Natarajan, who, when he left
the paper, took away with him half a dozen experienced journalists to his new
habitat, The Bombay Chronicle.
Nevertheless some hot
heads resigned soon after I left,and then was born the idea of a
newspaper owned by its readers. The team consisted of M.P. Iyer,K.
Shivram, M.K.B. Nair,A.K>B. Menon, Bal Thackeray, P. Ravindran, all
journalists who had worked for the Free
Press Journal, and a lone non-journalist, Sunil Biswas, brother of music
director and producer, Anil Biswas, a sympathiser.
The journalists had one
thing in common : the proprietors of the Free Press Journal had not kept the
journalistic standards set by Sadanand, and they felt it was time to start a
cooperative venture where no big money would be involved.
That was also the time,
the late 50’s, when all newspapers in Bombay tended to blackout all trade union
news. There was no difficulty to give a title to the owners of the new paper.
As we intended, the
readers would own it- Readers’ Publication Limited was registered with the
Registrar of Joint Stock Companies. Shares priced at Rs. 10 were to be sold to
all prospective readers and others who really wanted to help a venture such as
this were allowed to invest a maximum of Rs. 1,000.
Our own philosophy of
the newspaper was set out in these words: “Readers” Publications Ltd. Is the
first venture of its kind planned to ensure healthy cooperation between
intelligent newspaper readers and conscientious working journalists. Basically,
the idea was born out of revolt- revolt against the treacherous curbs on
thoughts and ideas imposed by the overlords of the press; revolt against
tyranny that is unscrupulous and insidious which has made a mockery of the
freedom of the press by forging shackles on the reporter, the sub-editor, the
cartoonist, the columnist and the editor
The press today has
passed into the hands of vested interests. It is controlled by men who have big
stakes in business profits and in politicking by small men who will trade for a
licence or some preference, by those who have no stakes in the profession and
no conscience worth the mention.
Have you ever paused
awhile to figure out how and why yesterday’s stockbroker has suddenly got
transferred into today’s newspaper proprietor? Have you enquired why and how
most of the newspapers most of the time shout and scream against popular
movements and government measures which ( your instinct and reason tell you)
are just and justified? It’s time every intelligent newspaper reader did just
that....
“It’s not the journalist
alone who is concerned with the freedom of the press. Every citizen whi has a
stake in the future of the Republic is vitally concerned with the Fourth
Estate. That’s where we begin :for Readers” publications Ltd., offers an
opportunity to every intelligent newspaper reader to own a newspaper in
association with experienced working journalists who will run the paper--- a
paper which will have no axes to grind and no punches to pull where the
interests of the people and nation are concerned.
Just imagine a newspaper
that is not owned by big business or managed by small merchants. Think of a
newspaper that is owned by say, 50,000 ordinary Indian newspaper readers- a
paper that is run by experienced journalists whose interest begins and ends
with straight and simple journalism. Such a newspaper, if only it can be a
reality, can, and will keep news sacred and let comment be free.
Today, such a newspaper
is in the realm of reality. That newspaper is going through its birthpangs.
When it is born, it will be the first free newspaper in the country owned and
run by the people for the people. That newspaper is proposed to be called Newsday.
From the very outset the
promoters realised that the support and backing of the working class of Bombay
were vital to the success of the project and they sought the cooperation of
several trade union leaders of the city. A public appeal was issued under the
names of M.V. Donde, George Fernandes, G. H. Kale, Maniben Kara, S. R.
Kulkarni,S.Y. Kolhatkar, Raja Kulkarni, P.K. Menon, Vithal Chowdhary, H.N. Trivedi, G. Sundaram, P.K. Sawant, Rajni
Patel, Manohar Kotwal, D.K. Kunte, M.R. Kulkarni,Tulsi Boda, R.J. Mehta,A.S.R.
Chari, K.K. Mundul and R.S. Tonsekar.
They said, “ A newspaper
owned by its readers and run by experienced journalists must command the
unflinching support of everyone who takes a healthy interest in current
affairs, especially the working class and the middle class who today find it
difficult to secure a platform to ventilate their views. Readers’ Publications
Ltd.,-- a cooperative venture of working journalists and intelligent
readers—has come into being with the specific object of publishing such a
newspaper.”
“ The promoters of
Readers’ Publication Ltd., plan to start their
reader-participation English daily in Bombay soon after they collect Rs.
4 lakh through ordinary 10-rupee-shares”.
The task of approaching
several thousands of newspaper readers is a stupendous one. It is here that
trade unions and other organisations of workers and the middle class have a
major role to play.The promoters largely depend on trade unions and popular
organisations to help them in enlisting subscribers to the share capital.
“ We have discussed this
with pioneering project with the promoters and are convinced that it deserves
the full cooperation and support of all those who feel the need for an
independent newspaper. We appeal to all trade unions and organisations,
irrespective of political or other affiliations, to support this progressive
venture and enlist every worker as a shareholder in Readers’ Publications Ltd.
It is a project, the success of which largely depends on the support it
receives from trade unions. It is a project, the success of which will greatly
help trade unionism in the country”.
All these were big names
among the working class of Bombay at that time and some of them are still
commanding the allegiance of several thousand transport, dock, textile and
chemical and engineering workers.
Many of them were
confident that it would be easy to persuade union members to buy a share in the
new company which would float a daily morning English paper, committed to
giving publicity to all news pertaining to trade union activity, but not bound
to support every strike or every demand of the workers. Some of the signatories
to the appeal also held out the hope that they would be able to enrol as many
as 20,000 or 30,000 individual 10-rupee-shareholders.
On the strength of these
assurances, the promoters went ahead printing share certificates and going
around the city, visiting residential colonies, canvassing from door-to-door as
the city was being lashed by the monsoon of 1959. In July of that year, the
target date for the new paper was January 26, 1960, but by November end the
number of shareholders had not come up even to 10,000 and our capital was under Rs. 50,000. We had
nothing else with us except our journalistic experience.
Should the project be
postponed or abandoned? Should we opt for a daily, or for the time being, only
have a Sunday morninger. These agitated all of us. Eventually it was decided
that the target date must be met and that it would be a daily morninger. This
again was decided on the hope held out by our backers that once the paper
started publication, more and more shareholders could be enrolled.
The next big question
was the mechanics of getting the paper printed.We had no press or type-setting
machines, we had no rotary to print the paper. All that we had at that stage
was an office with 2 small rooms in the Aga Khan Building of Dalal Street.
It was a crazy idea with all of us that we should have an address at Dalal
Street from where the Free Press Journal was being
published.
M.P. Iyer, who was the
most outstanding crime reporter in Bombay, had very many contacts in useful places
and so had both, Ravindran and Bal Thackeray. Initially they had thought of
getting the paper set up and printed at Acharya Atre’s Maratha, which had both,
spare office space and printing capacity. This fell through possibly because Maratha
did not consider us financially sound.
Hectic exploration
continued for other means. Finally, it was thought advisable we should go to
someone who knew the problems of a daily paper and the choice fell on Vindhya
Press owned by K.S.S. Raghavan ( formerly of the Free Press Journal &
Bombay Chronicle). At his premises on Bhavanishankar Road, he had one large
office room and opposite to that the press which had 3 lino machines. This,
however, did not solve our problem. He could spare the machines only at night and
3 lino machines could not cope with the news copy even of a 4-page newspaper.
Thus it was that we were
compelled to operate from two places.All day we slogged away at Dalal Street
getting news copy composed at another small press in Gunbow Street and at night
the crew shifted its venue to Vindhya Press. At both places we had PTI
teleprinters and the Vindhya office was at our disposal all night. In a
dilapidated van whatever was composed at the Fort press was carted to
Bhavanishankar Road. The pages were made up there and then...
Well, I am going ahead
of the fevelopments as they actually occurred.The choice of a name for the
paper presented many problems.It had to be one that did not figure on the
Directory of the Registrar of Newspapers. Our first preference was Daily News,
but there was a daily bulletin of that name put out by the Bombay Cotton
Exchange. Such was the fate of several other titles.
One afternoon, we met
Gulzarilal Nanda,then Union Labour Minister, when he had come to Bombay when
this topic cropped up again. Finally, it was he who asked “ Why not Newsday?”I
wonder whether he was aware at that time there was in Long Island, New York, Newsday
which was a very successful paper. I did not.
Having got a name and
managing to scrape throught the composing problem, we still had to find a place
where the paper could be printed. Some of us met Junior Cama of the Bombay
Chronicle Press which had the capacity to print.( The Chronicle had
closed down earlier). Like all hard-headed businessmen he made several
enquiries about our finances and our backers and he finally popped the
question: “Why don’t you revive the Bombay Chronicle?”
Looking back on the
troubles and travails we went through, now I think that was not a bad
suggestion. But that would not have been our paper and we could not have
redeemed the pledge we had made to our shareholders. So that was out.
Our next call was at the
RMDC
Press in Worli where Chamarbaughwala had an excellent press and a rotary that could
print either a tabloid or a normal sized newspaper. I had known RMDC when he
was associated with the Sunday Standard and I was a
mere sub-editor there. After he left the Standard he had gone in for the
English football pools and later to the RMDC crosswords from Bangalore because
the puritan Bombay Government had banned crosswords carrying attractive prizes.
Though he had a rotary
it was not put to much use and we went to the old man for advice and help.
Again it was a hard nut to crack. Businessman from head to toe,he agreed to
compose some copy for us plus print the paper on the rotary, provided we did
not ask for a single day’s credit. Which meant he will print the paper one day
and before he accepted the order for the next day, we had to pay up by a cheque
that would not bounce, and if it bounced we had to pay in cash, otherwise the
contract was null and void.
He also gave us some
fatherly advice: “Why not a tabloid? Why not get in some big shots to invest
money when you have their good will? Your trade union politics is all
nonsense.” Anyway, it was Chamarbaughwala who agree to print our paper on the
morningof January 25, 1960, a day ahead of the target date.
The logistics of this
operation meant editorial work at two places, composing at three places, pages
being made up at Dadar and finally carried to the rMDC Press at Worli for
printing. Our operations started each day around 10 a.m. and did not end until
6 a.m. the next day!
Though we did not have
money, we had a good name in the market. With a talented cartoonist like
Thackeray in our team we had to capitalize on his pungent comments on current
affairs. This meant expenses on block-making- Bombay’s leading block-maker
Express Blocks helped us out, never asking payment for months. When Newsday
finally closed down they were one of the principle losers.
Fida Ali, the city’s
leading newsprint dealers, also gave us credit. Our 4-page paper at that stage
needed only one roll for 2 days.They were also losers in the end. The only
party which exacted every pie was the RMDC.
Among our shareholders
were such distinguished people like V.K. Krishna Menon who wrote a very
encouraging and sympathetic letter and subscribed for 25 shares.
Menon wrote : “ I am
glad to hear journalists cooperating to promote the profession. You may recall
that I spoke under the auspices of the Working Journalists in Bombay 2-3 months
ago on the subject of cooperation in relation to newspaper production.”
“ You have been good
enough to send me some share application forms for your new venture. I feel
people ought to associate themselves with a venture of this kind without in any
way trying to seek or obtain and influence, or to place themselves in a
position of direct or indirect control. This is the way of cooperation. I hope
all those who work in your venture will also become shareholders in it now, or
in the future- and your readers will also do the same progressively. This can
happen if you persevere and demonstrate to the people the purpose and
possibilities of cooperation”.
“ I enclose a cheque for
Rs. 150 and a share application form,if your society is in a position to allot
me 15 shares, which I hope serves as a token of participation. I wish your
venture success”.
I don’t think we
receives a more encouraging or more sincere message from another.
Among the other
shareholders were S.K. Patil, K.K. Shah, Rajni Patel, Dr. A. V. Baliga, very
many film stars and journalists and people from advertising and public relations.
Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru’s secretary wrote to say that as a matter of principle the Prime Minister could
not subscribe to the shares, but wished the project every success.
On the morning of
January 25, when we reached the RMDC Press with our four pages, it was past six
o’clock, and the “old” man who was present at the rotary press was furious
telling us” at this rate you will never reach any where”.
Reluctantly he agreed to
print the paper, muttering that we may have to pay overtime to his staff who
had been summoned to print the paper at 4 a.m. I remember, having been late on
the first day, we printed only some 5,000 copies.
Selling the paper was as
difficult as producing it. The newspaper distribution in Bombay for long had
been the monopoly of 3 leading agents, one of them a politically conscious UP
man, who had established his business in Bombay in a thorough-going manner.
Even when the paper was printed on time and people asked for it, the usual
answer was,” it has not come out today” and later we discovered many copies of
the paper tucked away under the unsolds of various other newspapers of the
previous day. After working for 18 or 20 hours a day, we did not have the
energy to hawk the paper ourselves nor had we the resources to bribe the agents
and the hawkers.
All the time, some of us
had to persevere with selling shares,some had to chase advertisers. The brunt
of the editorial work fell on M.K.B. Nair and A.K.B. Menon; K. Shivaram
continued with enrolling shareholders, seeking advertisements and driving the
van from one joint to another. Ravindran was, by far, the most successful, both
in getting financial backing and advertisements. There was some professional
jealousy between Ravindran and Thackeray,
both being cartoonists and we had
resources to use only one, the latter being the better artist. But I
don’t think this ever came to a head.
Since we left the Free
Press Journal, some of us had drawn a salary though the articles of
association provided for a remuneration of Rs. 500 to the promoters who were
working for the paper in a full-time capacity.
In the chequered
10-month-long history of Newsday, only once was this amount
paid out. Financially I was the most solid of this whole team: I had 16 months’
provident fund accumulations, 8 months gratuity, six months’ severance pay
which all added up to about Rs. 40,000.
As Newsday was slowly
creeping towards its eventual end, much of this saving was ploughed into the
paper to meet the demanda of creditors. Myself and Shivram had small babies for
whom we could not buy tinned milk; the other colleagues had lived on onions and
buttermilk on several nights. The morale was slowly sinking but no one was
willing to call it a day.
Among the
morale-boosters was the late R.P. Iyer, who used to write a satirical column
under the title”Arpee’s Arena”. P.K. Ravindranath, though not a regular member
of the team, helped us with cinema reviews. M.R. Gopalakrishnan, Sadasivan and
Bhaskaran helped with subbing, the last doing the sports coverage too.
Although the promoters
all had above average journalistic abilities, none of them could practice their
profession because of the other pressures. I don’t recall M.P. Iyer, the ace
reporter ever having done full justice to a story.
One plank on which we
hoped to capitalise wa the bifurcation of
Bombay into Maharashtra and Gujarat, with Bombay city s capital of the
former. But even before Newsday was born, the Centre had undone the mischief of
the State’s Reorganisation Commission. Two months after the launching of the
paper, came the Central Government employees’ strike on which some of us had
held different views.
My personal view was
that the leadership was weak, that the strike would fizzle out and, whatever
strength the employees had acquire would be dissipated, and that it would take
another decade to recover from the debacle. Some others on the team felt
that a paper like Newsday pledged to
back the working classes should take a sympathetic attitude to the strike.
Anyway even though the
coverage of the strike news raised the circulation of the paper to a dizzy
42,000 from a paltry 4,000, the strike brought about a split and both, M.K.B.
Nair and A.K.B. Menon resigned. This did not precipitate the decline of the paper,
but now I realise I should have accepted the majority verdict, though it could
not be easily ascertained as all six of us
could seldom meet.
Meanwhile, the financial
crisis deepened. K.K. Shah came to our rescue- we had to depart from our principles and welcome
support from wherever it came. Fatehsingh Gaikwad, then Deputy Minister for
Defence, contributed Rs. 50,000 with no strings. When that money came, all of
us took one month’s salary, but the whole of it vanished in no time as we had to clear up arrears.
Apart from his share
money of Rs.1,000, Dr. Baliga contributed another Rs. 5,000; Manubhai Bhimani,
another sympathiser pumped in Rs.19,000. I took a personal loan from all those
who would lend to a sinking ship, among them S.A. Sabavala, Manubhai and some
of my neighbours.
We had some advertising
support, notably from ISCON which was then constructing the steel plant in
Durgapur, from Imperial Tobacco Company, from Khatau, Stanvac and Lintas,the
Central Government’s advertising wing-DAVP- also helped because of the good
offices of men like Krishna Menon and
Gulzarilal Nanda.
Our trade union patrons
lets us down badly. George fernandes who ws the undisputed leader of several
powerful unions and hoped to raise Rs. 3 lakh, could not do better than Rs.
19,000, the highest that any of the signatories to the appeal did. In a crisis,
he had even drawn from the union funds to the tune of Rs. 10,000 and to bail
him out, the first call on the Baroda bounty was the return of this
unauthorised loan. Share money came in small trickles, but when the final tally
was made,we had collected only Rs. 49,000 through members of Readers’
Publications Limited.
Vindhya Press soon gave
up composing because we had defaulted; Fida Ali had reached his limit in
extending newsprint credit and RMDC refused to give credit even for a single
day.
Early in September,
Newsday was bankrupt, though there was an outstanding of a few thousands from
advertisers. The paper had to be closed down. Readers’ Publications Ltd., was
there, an acrimonious annual general meeting was held, when some members
suggested liquidation of the company. For that, another notice had to be
served, the creditors informed and another meeting held. We did not have the
money to summon a meeting or liquidate the company.
About that time, the
team had also been reduced by strength. The sheer problem of making both ends
meet made Bhaskaran, Thackeray, M.R.G and others to seek jobs elsewhere.
Myself, Iyer and Shivram were left on the scene along with Matkekar who was accountant,
company secretary,sales organiser, all rolled into one.
Hope, they say, is
eternal. We still hoped to resurrect Newsday and we did. This time, it was
Dharamsey Khatau who came to our rescue. At a long meeting we had at the
Lakshmi Building, at the instance of Manubhai Bhimani, he asked us what our
problems were and on being told we did not have the tools, only the readiness
to work, he asked what the machinery would cost.We opted to buy 3 lino machines
for which Khatau agreed to give us a loan of Rs. 1 lakh. Two we bought from
RMDC and a third from some other party. These were installed in a shed given to
us by RMDC in Parel.
With renewed hope we
started work again but this time the printing had to be done at the Associated
Printers of the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan.They also wanted cash payment every day.
From September to mid-November we dragged along and somehow managed to bring
out the paper. A day before Nehru’s birthday ( November 14), Associated
Printers also refused us credit and that was the end of Newsday.
In a last desperate
effort we went to S.K. Patil who was unmoved, and Dr. Baliga said he had
committed heavily to the Link magazine and could not help us.
On the evening of the 13
th I wept on the terrace of the Aga Khan Building and Iyer drew me back fearing
I may jump off. Months later Edatata Narayanan and K. D. Malaviya agreed to
take over the lino machines, which legally were the property of one of the
mills owned by the Khataus. These machines went to the Patriot which was
launched in 1963 in the capital.
When the final obsequies
were over, all of us went different ways in search of jobs. But, for quite a
long time, there were whispers as to who lost and who gaine through this
misadventure. There were insinuations that some of the promoters had made money
by diverting funds collected for the paper. To the best of my knowledge, not a
single one of us connected with the paper made any money and, as stated earlier
through the 10-month-long ordeal, no one got more than Rs.500 as a month’s salary.
There were no secret
negotiations for salvaging the paper. At one time, there was a suggestion that
S.A. Dange’s son-in-law may take over the paper. It fell through because he was
not sure whether he was buying a viable proposition. The only other political
approach we made was before the paper was started. We had made inquiries if we
could get Soviet printing and linotype machinery on concessional terms and
deferred payments. They declined.
Almost all those who
associated with Newsday were losers---all the shareholders, all the
sympathisers who gave loans, C.A. Menon, High Court Advocate who looked after
and advised on legal matters without any compensation, and even the peons, some
of whom had come from the Free Press Journal. No doubt the RMDC benefitted
because they exacted each day in cash the moneys owed to them and they were
also able to sell off two old lino machines to us at a reasonable price. I am
not sure what the Patriot paid for the lino machines and what Khatau lost in the
bargain.
For 2 years, after the
closure of the paper, as the company had not gone into liquidation, the
directors were plagued by the aftermath of failure.Telephone bills,
subscriptions to the Press Trust of India,dues on newsprint and block-making,
unpaid wages, rent on office premises and a dozen other demands were being
pressed on us. Of these, the telephone bills were settled against moneys owed
us by the Government of India for advertising. During the week that Newsday
was facing closure, we learnt afterwards, Lintas ( advertising agency for
Hindustan Lever) had decided to give us a contract for Rs.6,000 for the first
quarter of 1961, the DAVP also had decided to help us in a bigger way than
before. We just could not keep the paper alive to make use of these gestures of
goodwill.
I and my colleagues have
often asked ourselves: Why Newsday had failed? Some
newspapermen were of the view that no two journalists could agree, that a
cooperative would never succeed. Even today, I do not believe this to be
correct. We had minor differences on policy but these could have been ironed
out by compromise and more intelligent discussion than was possible under the
stress and strain of the daily routine. I still do not doubt our ability to
produce a good newspaper. All those involved with Newsday have fared very
well in the profession under more severe standards of judgement.
The basic drawback of
the project was that we did not have a press of our own. We did not have enough
money to pay for every service and goods
that we bought. We should have been content
with a weekly morninger, like the present Sunday Observer of Bombay. We
could have devoted at least 5 days a week to professional work and produce an
acceptable paper. Once that was established, we could have had better response
from the public for a daily.
Some have pointed out
that the trade union bias of the paper was the cause of its downfall.This
again, I don’t believe, for we were not committed to support blindly every
trade union demand. Of course, we learnt, at a heavy cost, that the union
leaders’ promises are not to be taken at their face value.
Some one asked me the
other day: Would you or why don’t you do it again? No. A newspaper is so
capital intensive, that if I had the capital, I would rather lend it to Khatau
Voiles or Vimal Fabrics at 15 per cent interest and relax, reading Peter
Cheyney.
