Subterranean Homesick Purples

Friends and foes readily admitted to my possessing some small talent for launching publications, but this gift was offset by my congenital inability to get on with proprietors. I was a boy-scout editor forever preaching professional certitudes and obsessed with trivialities like editorial independence. Instead of learning to work with the owner, protecting his interests in a spirit of give and take, I was on my own ego trip. In short, I was a fighter and, worse, a quitter. I was inclined to start a publication with some success. And then run away. I lacked stamina and staying power and, crucially, the capacity to work with a team.

I am not given to self-delusion, but when people told me who I was, I could hardly recognise myself. Fighter? Quitter? Boy-scout editor? Poor team leader? Unfortunately, I could not contest any of these unflattering descriptions because, on paper, the evidence against me was overwhelming. Had I not left/resigned three jobs in four years? Not surprisingly, I was entangled in a web of self-doubt, anxiety and depression—a fatal trio when you are jobless. Above all, I was fed up answering the question, "So, why did you quit The Pioneer?"

In the circumstances, an invitation to a media conference in Sydney seemed irresistible. Perhaps four days Down Under would help put my troubles behind me. Aussie beer, sunshine, the sight of bikini-clad women at Bondi beach might refresh and rejuvenate my tortured soul. Waiting to pick me up at Sydney airport was a former New Delhi Reuters chief. He welcomed me to Sydney and then immediately asked: "Is it true you’ve left The Pioneer?" Some things never go away.

On arrival back, I was confronted by the personnel manager of The Pioneer. He took away my car, my driver and told me I had 30 days to quit the rather comfortable company bungalow I inhabited.

I am just about a middle-class Punjabi boy with no family money or family farm, so this mandatory, time-bound requirement added to my insecurity, as did the numerous requests from publications to write regular columns. "I suppose that is what you will be doing now," said a sympathetic editor friend. In the profession, it was confidently assumed that my career was over. I had had my final drink at the Last Chance Saloon.

Time was my biggest enemy. I read newspapers in the morning, trashy novels at night, but the evenings seemed interminable. They were then the dread of my life. I developed a routine. At about 4.30 in the afternoon, I would summon a taxi to my house and go to the India International Centre where existed kindred (unemployed?) souls with time on their hands, and problems to make me feel mine were small change. Over tea, biscuits, malicious gossip and proposals of how to save our fragile republic, I was able to while away a few hours.

With my bank account dwindling and no fresh source of income, I felt the time had come to economise. So, instead of asking the taxi to come home, I decided to walk to the taxi stand, thereby saving a few rupees. One day (consumed with melancholy thoughts), on my journey to the taxi stand I fell into an open manhole. And clung desperately to the top. In those forty or fifty seconds, while I shouted and screamed for help, my whole life flashed before me. I thought this is the end. "Ex-editor falls into a manhole and dies" would be my brief and sorry obit. I cursed. Pulled myself up and had a few stern words with Vinod Mehta. What idiocy is this? Why am I wallowing in self-pity? In retrospect, falling into that manhole was the best thing that happened to me. It was the reality check I needed.

To be honest, the only new element I was able to introduce was the Diary. This I cannibalised from my Debonair days where I wrote the back page for seven years under the pseudonym, Gikki.

Dream Launch has become something of a publishing cliche. Nevertheless, on all the titles I have had the privilege of working, I have given special attention to the first issue. Even if you finally produce a dud, the first issue requires extra effort and care. An editor is doing himself an enormous disservice if he feels he can release a mediocre first issue and then gradually improve the publication along the way. In my view, since the editor has ample time to prepare for the launch number, it should be a cracker on day one at least.

I lucked on Nikhil Chakravartty. If the over-used word ‘doyen’ fitted any journalist in the ’90s, it was Nikhilda. For years, I had made it a practice to take him once a month for a liquid-and-solid lunch at a 5-star restaurant. He was simply the best informed journalist of his time, who had a fund of stories, from Feroze Gandhi to Ramnath Goenka to Indira Gandhi to young Sanjay. He was the confidant’s confidant. Over Chinese soup, he once told me, he possessed possibly the only draft of a novel the then prime minister Narasimha Rao had written when he was in the political wilderness. (This is the first time I am revealing my Deep Throat.) It was a highly political novel—you could guess the characters, including Indira Gandhi—with, believe it or not, a few steamy passages. I am not giving away any state secrets when I disclose that PV liked the good life. I gently asked Nikhilda if I could have a copy of the draft. Of course, he replied. He felt he was in no way betraying a friend who had given it to him for critical evaluation. It would show, Nikhil believed, that the apparently dour and humourless PV possessed unsuspected literary and imaginative skills. It would enhance his stature as prime minister.

Simultaneously, I was working on another story idea. In the history of the Indian nation-state, no empirical assessment had ever been made of the views of Kashmiri Muslims. I commissioned an opinion poll which, miraculously, we managed to conduct successfully.

So, I had not one but two crackers. Which one to put on the cover? We went with the opinion poll, making Narasimha Rao’s novel the second lead. (I have been told subsequently by friends whose opinion I respect that the order should have been reversed.)

Meanwhile, another of our stories was attracting notice: the prime minister’s novel. The international media (The Economist did a big story) moved in, with the British tabloids picking up the sexier bits. Instantly, Outlook had acquired international fame too.

In the office, I got a call from the PMO. "The prime minister (who I knew en passant) would like to speak to Mr Vinod Mehta." I knew what was coming. "Who gave you the draft?" the PM asked without beating around the bush. I told him politely that I couldn’t give him that information. "Is it Mrinalini Sarabhai?" he persisted. "Prime Minister, you have been a journalist, you know I can’t reveal my source. I’ll be happy to print any clarification from your side," I told him. He banged down the phone. He never spoke to me again.

With a nice tail-wind behind us, I set about building on the dream launch. I had assembled a formidable team, some old loyalists, others keen to see if my reputation for giving "freedom" to my writers and editors was fact or fiction.

I am often asked if there is any magic formula for creating a successful publication. If such a formula exists, I am ignorant of it. My own recipe is actually quite unoriginal: collect the best possible journalistic talent and then create an environment in which that talent can flourish and flower. Naturally, the editor must know his own mind, he should have an unequivocally clear idea of the big picture. In the case of Outlook, I was determined to produce a liberal-centrist magazine in which informed debate and dissent held primacy. Alert readers of the tenth anniversary issue will notice many pieces critical of Outlook. All of these—and I stress all—were specifically invited.

If I find too much consensus developing around a story idea, I play the Devil’s Advocate.I deliberately raise negatives to get a debate going and to ensure that both the strengths and weaknesses of the idea get discussed. Eventually, most decisions are taken by consensus or by majority opinion. Since everyone has had an opportunity to make his/her point, the losers do not feel aggrieved. Democracy at our conference is a living, tangible and observable thing.Some people tell me I allow too much democracy. Well, better too much than too little.

My colleagues know that I take no sides, support no friends, promote no party, advocate no ideology (except in very broad terms), push no dogma.

When I go out socially and people praise Outlook, I am, of course, delighted; but when they are critical, my ears really perk up. I am more interested in hearing criticism rather than praise because criticism can often lead to self-correction. The notion that journalists and editors are infallible, that their judgements are always sound and objective, that national interest is top of their mind, is tosh. We are prone to both error and bias. And it is good to have outside reminders of that fact.

As an editor, I am still learning, still educating myself.I try never to forget the last line from Billy Wilder’s classic film, Some Like it Hot: "Nobody is perfect."