20 Years of The News: Reaching for Greater Heights

By Amir Zia
The News
Special supplement
February 22, 2011

Those were the days when you went to the office with a spring in your step and a fire in your belly. Wherever there was a big story, some of us jumped liked paratroopers to get a byline. There was great comradeship, but stiff competition.

Only a handful of journalists get a chance to be part of the launch team of a newspaper in their lifetime. A smaller number can boast that their team had just the right blend of experience and youth. And fewer get the opportunity to witness the technological revolution of an industry. The launch of The News in February 1991 made all these three possible for us.

From rickety old typewriters, stacks of rough paper, the manual labour of page-making and telex machines to the wonderful world of computers, it was indeed a great leap forward for print journalism in Pakistan. The young ones were in awe of the brand new Macintosh machines. The computers allowed them to rewrite, cut, paste and improve the copy in the blink of an eye. They helped with spellings and even allowed them to kill time with free games of crystal quest and solitaire. Some just played – climbing higher and higher on the ladder of levels in their quest for crystals and others balanced pleasure with work. Computers were an ultimate luxury at that time, which those born in this age take for granted.

Some of our seniors missed old typewriters as one misses a beloved. The nostalgia for typewriter ribbons, rough paper and the loud rattle of the typewriter keyboard was immense. Some of them made it a point to get typewriters’ rattling sound from computer keyboards. No wonder, many computer keyboards suffered fatalities.

But it was not just the technology that made The News the most exciting and happening project of its time - it was a trend setter in more than one way.

The biggest remained the freedom to experiment, expand boundaries and explore new grounds in journalism. From the conservative news writing and editing style to a creative and unconventional one and, from a controlled newsroom culture in most newspapers of those times, to a more open and liberal one - The News has many firsts to its credit.

With Ghazi Salahuddin as its founding editor in Karachi and Imran Aslam as News Editor, one could have expected nothing less than what the initial years of The News had to offer to its team in terms of work environment and exciting content to its readers. A bold new voice set to report, articulate, simplify, explain and analyse – all the news that mattered.

“Now every dawn will break with The News,” was one of our launch slogans.

Ghazi “Saheb” was often seen parading visitors through the once-swanky offices of The News in its pre- and post-launch days or huddled in meetings with senior team members with the occasional exchange of greetings with juniors like us on the stairs or fourth or fifth floor offices. It was not that our softspoken, gentle Ghazi Saheb kept his doors shut to us, but many of us juniors stayed clear of his path because he was the editor. For many who were at the start of their career or starting their first ever job, the stereotypical image of ‘tough editor’ remained glued to their minds.

It was Imran Aslam who usually was the victim of oppressive attention from young reporters and sub-editors of that time. We used to barge into his office to get our “special” stories edited. The ones we thought the city or the national desk would not be able to polish and shine to make them worthy of our bylines. Imran always had time to guide juniors, though I wonder now how he managed to edit stories and even do translations with all the other pressing work. During those days, he stayed away from the computer. Yaqoob Haroon typed for him as Imran dictated changes, correcting articles, putting in the right prepositions, removing adjectives and replacing them with powerful verbs, adding a line here and a word there, which made the copy standout. The next day we would take credit for all the good in the story, though the best words and sentences came from Imran. Often we wanted his time to discuss ideas which, in 99.99 per cent cases, used to be a one-way traffic from Imran - one idea after another. How many were wasted in our raw hands or did not see the light of the day remains for another story. When there was no other pretext left, it was just the pleasure of listening to him on issues ranging from politics to literature, the 1970s Balochistan insurgency to Quaid-e-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s politics, Che Guevara to Maulana Maudodi and novel to drama. And when Imran was not in his room, we went inside to read British tabloids stacked in the office to improve our writing. But often it was the Page 3 of The Sun, which commanded our attention the most.

There was a star-studded team of seniors at that time from whom young reporters had loads to learn and unlearn.

Abbas Nasir, the Chief Political Correspondent of The News in those days, not just gave reporting tips and shared experiences, but also rewrote copies of juniors, giving them the much-needed punch, the angle, the depth of background and analysis. There never was a dull moment in Abbas Nasir’s presence.

We had Abid Ali Syed as Editor Style and Production, who used to fret about the way we committed “atrocities” on the English language. Despite being an easy-going and softspoken person, he kept us on a tight-leash when it came to reporting and writing standards.

Najma Sadeque, the editor of the weekend magazine “We”, was a tough task master and demanded highest level of dedication and focus from those who reported directly to her or contributed to her pages. “We” was replaced by “The News on Friday” in the mid 1990s, which is now “The News on Sunday.”
Sadeque now works for a nongovernment organisation.

The late Iqbal Jaffery, the first city editor of The News, was an institution unto himself. He already had seen the peak of his career as a correspondent of BBC and The Associated Press and The News was his last job. No reporter could take him for a ride - he knew the city and most politicians like the back of his hand. He kept a hawk’s eye on his reporters, instilling the core values of accuracy, impartiality and fairness among them. He could scold you for catching a cold and be kind when one least expected it.

Qaiser Mehmood, who was initially a senior commerce reporter but later became chief reporter, had untiring stamina and determination to chase and hound reporters 24/7. He was often the first to arrive and the last to leave the office. He turned down all our requests to find a girlfriend or a wife who could have diverted his attention. He left The News ages ago, but remains a confirmed bachelor even today.

The highly talented, but fiery-tempered Imran Sherwani, was everywhere in the pre-launch and post launch days, making pages, editing and writing stories for many of us and at the same time fighting, arguing, shouting. It was fun to be with him - a man divided between the love of journalism and theatre. He also left The News in its initial years.

The reporters’ room gave an impression of a gas-chamber most of the time as we lighted one cigarette after another. The heavy smell of tobacco of every kind and flavour hung in that smoke-filled room. Yes, in the early 1990s, we had not become civilised enough to ban smoking in air-conditioned offices.
It was still the rough-and tough world of journalists.

The reporting team of those days mostly comprised of youngsters or the young at heart. Undoubtedly, it was the dream team for any newspaper. Those were the days when you went to the office with a spring in your step and a fire in your belly. There were beats, but many of us never cared about them. Wherever there was a big story, some of us jumped liked paratroopers to get a byline. There was great comradeship, but stiff competition. No wonder, members of The News launch team today hold some leading positions in the national media.

Azhar Abbas, who covered the city government at that time, is the managing director of the country’s biggest channel — Geo News. In a retrospect, Azhar had the remarkable ability of staying calm and getting a story without making a fuss or wrinkling his dress even then.

Murtaza Solangi, currently the Director General Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation, was the first high-tech reporter of The News - keeping his contact list in an electronic diary. He ruled the diplomatic beat and passionately covered the nationalist and left-wing parties.

Owais Tohid, perhaps the only reporter among us who wore branded clothes, loved to write “colour” pieces. In the initial days, he covered the health beat with a special focus on leprosy and aids patients and later moving on to political and crime beats before he left The News to work for AFP and other media organisations.

Then, we had late Zuleikha Ali, who died young in an accident in the initial years of The News. She made her mark in a short span by writing moving stories on wildlife and the environment.

Kamal Siddiqi, now editor at The Express Tribune, was among the key business reporters. He was always gentle, friendly and focused on his work, as he is today.

The late Sarwar Naseem covered the education beat, while young guns including the bubbly Javed Soomro and the thoughtful Nusrat Amin added depth to the political and court reporting along with seniors like Manzoor Hussain, Zarar Khan and Shujaat Ali Khan. Mohiuddin Azam, sang as he typed stories. He was one of the most prolific reporters of the initial team.

The 1991 team has scattered long ago. Macintosh computers have been replaced by unbranded ones and The News offices may not look that swanky and modern now. However, in the eyes of some young reporters of the current team, one finds the same passion and hunger for stories that was the hallmark of the initial team. The legacy of The News lives on.

— The writer was member of the launch team and rejoined The News in March 2010 — after15 years of working with some of the leading national and international media organizations.