Is it a mystery that Gujarat do not have its own Press Club?

Gujarat Media Club was celebrating its seventh fruitful years of completion. With no government support and only a handful of PSUs coming out to help the association of ‘influential’ journalists, the event was a landmark in itself. I have been associated with it since the beginning and last two years as its Secretary General.

Among the invitees- which included top bureaucrats, ministers, economists - there were a few retired journalists as well whom GMC had honoured a couple of year back. Basant Rawat, one of the GMC Members was given the task to personally invite each one of them and if necessary arrange transport. Except one, who was in the ICU, everyone came. One of them was Umesh Narain - a respected journalist by talent. Basant, who went to his home to invite him wrote to me - “ the condition of Umesh Narain is very painful, pathetic , he  lives  in wretched condition- very scary picture of a former journalist. However, he  was very happy and   honoured to get the invite..  He will come on his own, though we will have to arrange to drop him back at his rented house in Shahpur.” At around 8.30 PM, he asked Basant whether he could go as it was not possible to get a transport late in the night. Basant in turn asked me if I could arrange some transport so that he can stay back and have dinner. 

I promised to arrange a transport or get it done by myself but send him back to the auditorium from the exit door. At 10 PM, when the food counter opened, he was struggling to get a plate. All the current journalists were jostling to network with one or the other VIP. A few came with their own so called VIP entourages and stuck to them. But I saw Basant - who may have felt ashamed of the humiliation this 75 year old journalist was suffering at the hands of a roaring public out to attack the food counter - helped him out. 

As he was having his food - all alone - I was frantically searching for some cars which could get him dropped. It would have been an insult to him if we had hired an auto and pay the fare. I asked a few but their cars were full. I asked those whose cars were presumably empty but they said it is too late to do this ‘hard’ job. So I turned to one of my own friends - whom I had invited and not a journalist - to do the job of dropping this senior journalist home. He was more than happy and readily agreed. 

At 10.20 PM, Umesh Narain left Karnavati Club Golden Glory hall on a Mercedes-Benz B Class.

Why I am narrating this entire episode here is the utter disrespect we do to talent and the more than necessary attention we give to those who are nothing but sycophants of one or the other power circles. This is precisely the reason why these relations gets converted into personal ambitions leaving organizational aspirations to bite the dust. The web of this disease is spread across the state. The very fact that despite six decades of Gujarat’s existence, despite our ambition to build the tallest statue, gift city, biggest solar generation plants and compete with developed world - it is a shame we dont have a space for Press Club. In other states, you dont need to ask for it. It is given on a platter. Journalists belong to different organisations and the fourth estate has to meet and network with each other for various purpose. It is a different matter that most of these clubs are now big bars. 

Here it is not the government which is at fault. It is the selfish motives of individuals and inflated egos that has dented the existence of Press Club. Conventionally this would have gone for long had some people - irrespective of their own standings or ideologies - not come together and made an entity called Gujarat Media Club. Officially, the club have its own committee members decorated with beautiful names. Some have never bothered to attend a single meeting leave alone reciprocating the invite. While a few others do attend the meeting and throw a handful of ideas each time. When the meeting ends, the bury their ideas because they cannot execute them. So much so that people who have worked for the club reached a point of saturation. A situation of hopelessness. Something like the Congress Party office where there are more leaders than workers. There is not a single journalism institute in the state that can carve out good journalism students. There are hardly any opportunities now in the state. Who is responsible for such apathy? None else than the journalists themselves.

A press club is an amalgamation of journalists and all those professionally engaged in the production and dissemination of news to come together, meet frequently, share their ideas and get a sharper governance. Well, this is my definition and not Wiki’s. This definition may be full of verbs but in actuality no action happens. There are no amalgamation of journos happening here. No one meets each other. And we hardly strive to get ourselves tuned to give a tough time to government to deliver governance principles. 

Even in smaller towns - as remote as Jhabua - you have a local press club. This is the forum where people can come, sit and express their opinions so that if found fit, their voices can be heard by everyone through a mirror called newspaper. But when mirror itself becomes see through, there is no scope for such voices to be heard.

In Gujarat - to achieve such an objective is a distant dream. Only the rich can afford to speak their mind, promote their ideas, introduce their products. You need a polished PR firm or a person to get a good audience. You need some incentive to get it published. For the poor or for those who speak for the poor - Gujarat has no place - both literally and physically.

And even if they arrange with their own expenses, there are hardly one or two journos. When some important functions or events happen in your city, even a city tabloid is not interested to cover it. Because you dont have a place to sit and prick these shortcomings, newspaper editors and owners do what they want.

During my reporting days, I have been to almost all the major press clubs in the country because those were the places where I could barge in and get connected to the local fraternity. It made things so easy for someone like me who is not very known by face. When a journalist comes to Gujarat, he is lost in a vicious circle. It not a mystery anymore why the state is lagging behind in the culture of journalism, press clubs.

Typed and uploaded from my iPad. Regret errors and omissions