Dear Reader…..

You are a born-journalist, unless we journalists decide to deny this. You surely have your unique style of telling stories without fluttering an eyelid. You keep writing stories as well – in the form of letters, e-mails and even in complaints. But the minute somebody asks you to write for a newspaper, your pen screeches to a paranoiac halt. The minute any of us contemplates doing anything professionally, we get bogged down. We take to books, join courses and consult professionals. In this process often we end up learning a complicated methodology of handling simple things. In fact we professionals and academicians excel in presenting straightforward things in their knottiest best form.

But down the road, only after years of roughing out you learn what you should have been told to you at the very onset - doing things simply. I have rarely come across performing teachers, who will tell you that you can also do it. My bad luck. This book practically comes as my revenge towards those seniors, who love watching sagging young faces so that their one-up-manship remains intact. Ravi Shanker’s sitar possesses the same octaves as in any other similar instrument or Sachin Tendulkar’s willow also conforms to the standard dimensions of the bats available in the market. If they can do it, why can’t you? Agreed that these are people with some extraordinary gifted talent. The mute question however is whether each one of us has had a fair chance to explore our own latent talent? My answer is a big No. The reason is simple. Academics always present us with the mountainside of a molehill.

My next question is that does Ravi Shanker consult a musical notation to play a touching tune or Tendulkar gropes through the cricketing copybook to sweet time his shots? It comes to them fairly naturally. The only difference perhaps is that they have slogged to reach the superlative situation they possess today. They have slogged and risen through the ranks. It takes a while to reach a position and produce your best. Still all concerts are not superhits and each match does not produce a century. Imagine the first time when Ravi Shanker held a sitar and Sachin a bat. If you get it wrong in the formative stage, chances are that you will never get it right. This book is my sincere attempt for young journalists and journalists-to-be so that they take the right step forward.

Let me tell you that I have never believed in textbook journalism because it never happens that way. After working as a correspondent and later as an editor of some of the premier publications of the country, I always cherished this hope that someday I will share my experiences and will also try to juxtapose them on the academic definitions of the profession. The idea was to make the younger lot see how it works outside a classroom situation. Some of my colleagues kept pestering me to do a book on my experiences of reporting for newspapers, magazines, Television, Internet and also the art of communicating with the wide array of audience of a language newspaper.

Now as you hold this book, I can’t help thanking my editors and seniors, who chiseled out the journalist in me. I am indebted to my colleagues, who always encouraged me handsomely at each accomplishment. How can I forget to express my gratitude towards my family – my parents and then my wife and kids, who backed me up at all times, without being demanding at all, and allowed me a free swing of the bat. This book is dedicated to all of them and I hope it makes your innings much smoother. Now read on….