Heralding a close

For long years, an odd copy of National Herald had been a rare sight anywhere. But this once highly influential daily...

For long years, an odd copy of National Herald had been a rare sight anywhere. But this once highly influential daily newspaper, founded by Jawaharlal Nehru in Lucknow almost exactly a year before the start of the Second World War, had been languishing and limping for decades in both its birthplace and Delhi, where the edition started in the 8217;50s. Yet its demise on Tuesday is a wrench, especially to those with some association with, or knowledge of, the freedom movement and history of Indian journalism. It also brings back a flood of nostalgic memories. Along with it, Qaumi Awaz, its Urdu edition, that had larger circulation, relatively speaking, has also gone into limbo.

Some believe that the twin papers would reappear someday with modern technology. But this seems a vain hope. The acute financial difficulties, unending labour unrest on one occasion the workers in Lucknow gheraoed the then chairman of the board of directors, Abid Hussain, for 20 hours and archaic technology can in no way be overcome by its financier, the Congress party, in the future any more than it could in the past. There have been occasions when news agencies had stopped their services because they were not paid for months and months. The payment of staff salaries was also episodic.

In fact, insiders know that company directors repeatedly recommended the closure of National Herald and associated publications but Sonia Gandhi consistently refused to do so. 8220;This lamp,8221; she would say, 8220;was lighted by Jawaharlal Nehru; it must not be allowed to be extinguished8221;. Now, however, she seems to have bowed to reality.

The heyday of the Herald that always carried on its masthead Nehru8217;s famous saying, 8220;Freedom is in Peril, Defend it with all your might8221;, was in its initial years and just before and after Independence. At that time, except when in jail, Nehru often wrote signed editorials. And as the then editor of the paper, M. Chalapathi Rao, usually called M.C., told me, Nehru wrote a piece also when he was PM.

This happened in April 1954 on the day the US conducted the much-hyped Bikini nuclear tests in the Pacific atoll of the same name. By a coincidence, Nehru was in Lucknow that day. For some reason best known to him, he declined to comment on the chilling event when asked by reporters. But in the evening, to the consternation of all concerned, he drove to the office of the Herald, sat at a desk and wrote out, 8220;without a scratch8221;, a devastating signed piece, under the heading 8220;The Death-dealer8221;.

In the late 8217;30s and early 8217;40s, Indira Gandhi was in Switzerland or England. She was regularly sent important clippings from the Herald. For her part, she would send back her comments or 8220;unpaid contributions8221;. After her marriage, Feroze Gandhi became managing director of the paper. From 1946 until 1950, when he was elected to provisional Parliament, he held this job in Lucknow. Indira lived in New Delhi to run house for her father who certainly needed looking after.

Yet on one of her visits to Lucknow, on December 16, 1949, she wrote a long and angry letter to her father that needs extensive quoting, if only because it says a lot about her feelings for the Herald, her ire against the reaction of Pandit Govind Ballabh Pant8217;s government to the paper8217;s reporting and policy, and her unhappiness with her 8220;Pappu8221; for his unwillingness to do anything about this situation. 8216;

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8220;I don8217;t quite know how to begin this letter8221;, she wrote. 8220;The politics of this province stink 8212; and now the rottenness has come right into my house8230;Pantji likes to have only 8216;yes8217; men in the province and the whole ministry is very annoyed with the set-up at the Herald8230;I am not showing any favouritism when I say that the Herald is the only paper worth reading in India, with the one exception of the Madras Hindu.8221;

Her basic complaint was that Pantji and Chandra Bhan Gupta the provincial party boss were collecting proxy votes from the Herald8217;s shareholders to elect 8220;petty businessmen8221; of 8220;unsavoury reputation8221; to the paper8217;s Board. 8220;You tolerate a lot of things. But are you prepared to have the Herald, which everyone associates with your name, to be run by black marketeers? I am writing this against Feroze8217;s wishes. What happens to the Herald will make a big difference in my life8221;.

How the problem was finally solved has not been recorded. But in view of her strong sentiment for the paper, it remains a mystery why she did nothing to build up and modernise it when she was at the zenith of her power and glory. Some people said then that the problem was the editor, M.C., a much-respected and erudite man Nehru was fond of. He was also the founder of the Working Journalists8217; trade union. Indira apparently thought that he lived in the past. But she never took this up with him. Eventually, she got rid of him in a manner that was vintage Indira. She announced a celebration of Chalapathi8217;s completion of 30 years as editor. She made an eloquent speech in praise of him and casually announced his retirement that came him as a bolt from the blue.

Far from improving things, this worsened them fast. His numerous successors lacked the authority he had and the respect he enjoyed though, with age, he had become cantankerous. Most of the successors were eminently forgettable, in any case. Financial losses soared. Senior Congressmen, comprising the management, were out of their depth in facing them. What has happened was inevitable.

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While I was writing this, an old friend who used to like the Herald rang up to recite the first line of a couplet by Ghalib: Yeh bai-gor-o-kafan laash Asad khasta-tun ki hai. Roughly translated, it means: This corpse sans grave or shroud belongs to the fragile-bodied Asad, which was Ghalib8217;s other name.

The writer is a senior political commentator