The Weaker Voice

In Waves in the Hinterland, Naqvi talks about the barriers that Dalit women – uneducated, poor, schedule caste, female – broke through to be journalists. It would have been very easy for these women to just accept that they were dealt bad cards in life. But they chose to gamble (and win) using those cards. The issues of being a woman – the sexual innuendoes constantly thrown, the derogatory once-overs and the condescending attitudes are ubiquitous. But if these women, who are far more disadvantaged than I, can do it, I have no excuses.

Naqvi’s chronicling of Mahila Dakiya (MD)’s story serves as a lesson in elementary journalism. Very simply she addresses the problems that MD faced in its lifetime and emphasizes many basic premises – “the written word is permanent”, conversion of oral narratives into the written form without compromising on meaning or essence, writing simply, interviewing skills, the difference between a writer and a journalist, “ethics and perils of journalism” and language versus not so much dialect but colloquial speech. Even more practical are the Nirantar Workshop Reports that detail exactly how they dealt with these issues.

With the stories of MD and KL, Naqvi manages to allay my cynicism to a certain extent with respect to the journalism industry. The journalism seen in MD & Khabar Lehriya (KL) is true, honest journalism which Naqvi quotes, “is not guided by commercial interests … But the paper, like all the others before and since… has an agenda: To empower the women … to give them a voice, to strengthen their fragile literacy skills, and give them power to construct their own wor(l)ds”. She makes you believe that even in an age of commercialisation, true journalism can still make waves – in the hinterland or the urban jungle.

Read more:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farah_Naqvi

• http://www.nirantar.net/khabar.htm

 

http://www.flipkart.com/waves-hinterland-farah-navqi-story-book-8189884565

Femina’s Leading Lady

Vimla Patil’s motivation for penning her memoirs My Times is to tell “the story of the impact of such a journal [Femina] and … [paint] the portrait of an organisation which made such a journal possible. I don’t feel that she manages to do either in entirety.

Patil’s book seems to be divided into two; the good and the bad. In the first few chapters successes seem to be around every corner. She appears to have Midas’s touch. Femina does well consistently, with almost no pitfalls. And so does the Miss India venture. Any problems or hindrances that might have been there are usually skimmed over or overcome. This makes her memoirs appear not entirely genuine, like a part of the story is being withheld. I feel her achievements would have had a greater impact on the reader if equal importance had been given to shortcomings and successes.

Furthermore, her intention was to tell the story of the impact of Femina. This she does only in one chapter when she talks about eminent doctors demystifying women’s health issues in the journal. In many of the other chapters she details what how women’s status changed in three decades but does not clearly outline Femina’s contribution to the cause.

The last half a dozen chapters all focus almost entirely on the negative. She writes about Samir Jain and his abhorrent management policies, and has dedicated an entire chapter to Pritish Nandy’s inadequacies. She did have to deal with Nandy quite a bit but not so much with Jain. Thus most of her criticisms concerning Samir Jain are just hearsay and not based on first hand knowledge.

As the editor of one of India’s longest running women centric journals, I expected much more from Patil’s memoirs. But unfortunately, My Times fails to deliver an impact the way it was intentioned.

Read more:

• http://feminamissindia.indiatimes.com/

• http://www.femina.in/

• http://www.writerfind.com/vpatil.htm

http://www.a1books.co.in/my-times-memoirs/itemdetail/8174761489/

Jerusha Chande