After completing my Internship in a local daily in year 2018, I got a chance to work as Reporter for the national daily Hindustan Times at its Mohali Bureau in March last year.
It is the city I had only heard and dreamt of earlier but had never been to in my entire life. On researching about the city, I came to know that it’s called a wealthy city in India for best urban planning and modern architecture in the 20th century in India. It is also called as one of the cleanest cities in India. I decided to shift.
On joining the office, everything appears to be new. Be it city, people or colleagues. For a budding journalist like me, it was a great opportunity to work in such a big news room and senior editors, reporters with an experience of ten years or more.
On the first day of work, my city head, to whom I was told to report, asked me to see how other reporters were working and grab a little bit from them as I was new to the place.
Few days later I was asked to cover social activist Gurmehar Kaur who was in the city for an event based on the ‘woman’s space on social media’. Her interview was my first byline and this is how the journey began. A day later, I was assigned the beats like crime, education and civic stories and several outskirt areas. On focusing the beats education and civic stories were not a big deal to cover. But crime was a challenging one to cover with no experience while Punjab is known for the deadly crimes.
Giving tips, my another boss who covers Mohali crime told me to check all the police stations in the evening with the officials if there is any crime reported in the day. Well, crime stories matter there. One can drop their special stories but not crime events. Most of the crime stories use to go on page one. I started checking the police station in the evening and now the unfortunate part was the officials there who speak Punjabi and that I didn’t understand. I would insist, ‘Bhaiya Hindi Mai Bolo, Punjabi Samaj Nahi Aati’. Many of them use to respond, ‘Humhe Hindi Nahi Aati’. But later I started learning Punjabi from my office colleagues. They would say, that if you want do the reporting in Mohali, Punjabi is must as everything will be in Punjabi, even the press notes.
On checking police stations over phone, I was always unable to find the crime spots because the police officials there hardly share the crime spots while my boss gets to know everything within minutes. When she used to tell what’s in the crime today, I use to say nothing. Then she would divulge everything that had taken place in the day. This continued for the some months.
I remember on March 29 last year, a drug officer Neha Shoree was shot dead in her office in Kharar area of Mohali. It was a chance for me to learn how to cover crime and what details should be there in such stories. Later I started cultivating the sources on my crime beat that used to tell me about the crime spots in a day. Our desk was much cooperative in editing, though many a time copies were late from my side.
Days later, I got several page one stories on following this murder case. Later, several more major crime spots took place there like dacoity, murders, thefts and others. On December 6, a private school teacher Sarabjeet Kaur was shot dead in front of her five-year-old kid outside her school in early morning. Fortunately, my boss was on off those days and I had a great opportunity to cover the crime of entire Mohali district. Even the Sundays were much colourful because I got to cover the crime as my boss was off on the day. But seriously I learnt a new beat there which was once impossible for me to cover.
At a time when we have covered bullets, pellets, stone pelting and encounters in valley, covering crime in Mohali was a great experience. Thank you so much to my boss who taught me everything.
Gradually, I also started covering Education and civic stories and got its hold as well. Many stories used to be published on Page one.
On May 31 last month, I got a call from my HR saying that ‘I would have to resign seeing the financial crisIs in the newspaper due to covid-19 pandemic’. I tendered my resignation next day. Everything looked like a dream. Going there, reporting, making new friends, and venturing in the city. I found Punjabis very kind hearted people while they too believe that both the communities have suffered a lot. The simple food there was delicious also.
My suggestions to new budding JournalistS would be to move outside the valley once in life to learn the better journalism. They teach you every bit of it. Importantly, governments must intervene and provide a package to media industries so that the jobs of the journalist can be saved at the crucial times.
Everything vanished in while but the city has given me a lot of beautiful memories that will be cherished forever. I may never come back, but you will be missed.