Why I Love To Hate <i>Outlook</i>

A few years ago, I saw Body Snatchers, a film in which a group of extra- terrestrials entered the bodies of people without even their family discovering any change in them until some strange things began to happen. There’s a scene in which a child asks: “Where will you go, where will you hide?” No, I don’t mean to say that Outlook is strange. In fact, it captures the reader’s heart in a way as if it’s asking, “Where will you go, where will you hide?” After the long onslaught of broadcast media in the last two decades and now the buzz around social media, one has to admit that nothing beats real reading. And when it comes to a magazine like Outlook, one can’t but be intrigued.

I may not agree with everything Outlook says, nor would Outlook agree with most of what they perceive I say. But it is a mutual ‘connect’ that forces one to search for that big ‘O’ of Outlook on the newspaper stands. I’ve been writing my fortnightly column in the RSS magazine Organiser for five years without a break, so I realise how much effort an outspoken magazine like Outlook must put in to churn out all those sharply worded pages brimming with research. Socio-political pressures saddle the media and Outlook is no exception, but it’s never shown in its carefully worded edits and creatively designed pages.

Do I love Outlook? I am not sure. Do I miss reading Outlook if I can’t get access to it while travelling? Yes, for sure it is a body-snatcher, maybe mind-snatcher! I think Outlook has a third eye too, and investigates real stories about people like me rather than giving in to planted ones.

Dr Praveen Togadia, International working president of the VHP and a cancer surgeon

Outlook invites readers to take part in its 20th anniversary celebrations. Send us your bouquets and, more importantly, your brickbats. E-mail your entry to editor [AT] outlookindia [DOT] com