In the last part of this series I wrote about my pleasant and
memorable experiences as a journalist.
But it is not roses and roses all the way. In the current piece, I wish
to narrate the hardest times I have been through.
THE TRAVAILS OF EMERGENCY
(By Subbaram Danda)
That morning readers of the “Indian Express” all over the country
were at their wits’ end to know why there was blank space where the first
editorial of the newspaper should have been.
They were, however, quick to realise that it was the result of press
censorship imposed in the wake of declaration of emergency and a critical
editorial had been removed.
Thus began the darkest days for the freedom-loving scribes in
India. The trying times lasted 21 long
months during 1975-77.
At the behest of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi,
President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed declared a state of emergency on June 25, 1975
as “security of India was threatened by internal disturbances” among other developments.
It was announced on All India Radio by Indira Gandhi. The nation remained shocked.
The proclamation bestowed on the Prime Minister overwhelming
authority to rule by decree. It saw drastic curbs on civil liberties. Most of Indira Gandhi’s political opponents
were imprisoned.
Capping it all, the press was censored. At that time, radio and television were
state-owned. It was easy for the Centre to make them toe the line of the
government. Only the print medium was in
private hands.
I was a Senior Staff Reporter in the “Indian Express.” My newspaper was particularly targeted
because its owner Ramnath Goenka was a staunch supporter of Jan Sangh, arch
rival of the ruling Congress party.
Also, the newspaper was known for its forthright news and views.
As newspapers could not openly criticize imposition of
emergency, they devised their own ways of opposing it through sarcasm and
ridicule. On the first day of emergency,
the blank space in the editorial page of the “Indian Express” was eloquent enough
to inform the readers that the press was gagged under censorship.
The “Financial Express” went one step ahead. It carried in its editorial space in large
letters Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore’s poem, “Where the mind is without
fear, and the head is held high….” The verse concluded with a prayer, “into that
heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.”
Nothing could be more sardonic. It was powerful enough to convey the yearnings
of the people.
Though newspapers were not taken
over, they could not question imposition of emergency nor criticize government
policies. Views of opposition parties
were a taboo. The screen plays of films
and dramas had to be approved in advance. Though we were sure that some of our reports
would not see the light of the day, we had to type them out and transmit them
for the information of the resident editors of all editions.
Our telephones were tapped. Our movements were watched. At public meetings and press conferences,
which were selectively permitted, we could see sleuths of the Intelligence
Bureau in plain clothes mingling with the people. One such person turned very friendly to me
but I could not afford to slacken my vigil!
Country’s economic woes were
biting. A ceiling was imposed on the
quantum of dividends that companies could declare. Our office did not pay our salaries in
time. Our advertisers played hide and
seek. We all “voluntarily” agreed to a ten per cent cut in our take-home
pay.
In those days we did not have
computers, and news items had to be composed on Lino machines. Work on
“making” pages would start in the evening and would go on till the deadline for
each edition.
Every page had to be cleared by the
censor, which was the Press Information Bureau (PIB) of the Government of India
located at the Shastri Bhavan in Chennai.
Imagine the workload on the poor PIB
officers. They had to go through every
line of every item, including advertisements.
During my night shifts I had to go to the PIB with page proofs for its
clearance and I knew what it all meant.
It should be said that the PIB
officers were very friendly to us as they had always been, though they had to
do an unpleasant job. They would not, however, take any risk. They
would cut out mercilessly any news item that was “objectionable” and approve
only the rest of the contents.
Such deletions would create a major
headache back at the newspaper office as those columns had to be redone.
One way of getting over the problem was to remove the “objectionable” items and
leave blank space there. From the point of view of the newspaper, it
served a good purpose. Readers would know that news items there had been
censored. My newspaper had several blank spaces every day.
Some smart guy in the Central
Government wanted to plug this “loophole.” Censor rules were changed
overnight and fresh orders were issued that the newspapers should not leave any
blank space when distributed to the public. To get over this difficulty,
some innocuous news items were kept in reserve to be inserted into the space
left by the censored items. This meant
additional time-consuming work for the newspaper and getting fresh clearance
from the censor. The net result of
it all was that the newspaper would be printed very late and the distribution
mechanism would be thrown out of gear.
That was the state of Freedom of the
Press during the days of emergency. I cannot forget those days. It
was a challenge that had to be accepted. Later
I moved over to the “Financial Express” to be its Chief of News Bureau.
(RECOLLECTIONS will continue)
(Ends)
