Media in Andhra gets its own blog
Ashutosh Nayak
They call themselves ?a bunch of optimistic cynics?. They write about all the backroom dramas of Andhra Pradesh media organizations. What was earlier just restricted to the tea shops near to the newspaper offices has now become a source of news gathering of a different kind.
http://apmedia.blogspot.com has now become the most talked-about forum among journalists in Hyderabad like http://warfornews.blogspot.com/ in Mumbai and Delhi. Although nobody is able to trace the creator of the blog, the online diary has sparked enough controversies to keep the momentum going.
Interestingly, the blog reads more like a paparazzi-driven tabloid than anything else. The news here is just for journalists who are interested to know about people who rule media in Hyderabad.
Glance through the blog and you will get to know the spicy details, and even the secret affairs, of a newsroom. The sources of the blog are so strong that they can even tell you which editor went to Delhi (read to meet the top boss with some agenda) last time and who is planning to rock whose boat.
And here is an excerpt from the blog. ?Sharma itching to be back at TOI: The mutual hatred between the lady editor of Hyderabad Times and JS is common knowledge. The exchange of words between the two was in the open after which the lady walked out of the meet following JS¿ caustic remarks (he is good at semantics). The lady got even with him with her article in the supplement, commenting that some people (no marks for guessing who) had no idea of what fits P3 and what doesn¿t!? (For those who do not know, JS is Mr Jyotirmay Sharama, ex-editor of TOI, Hyderabad)
Unlike earlier when the editors were banking on their trusted aides in the newsroom for some information, now they are also tracking this blog very carefully to ensure that their image stays in tact. For example, Mr Sharma, a favourite discussion point for this blog, reacted to it after his name was mentioned in a snippet about a freebie-loving woman journalist.
?I read your blog with interest. The comments made by me a few weeks ago about a lady journalist taking free paintings was made at a panel discussion organised by the Young FICCI Ladies Organisation. The remark had nothing to do with any journalist in Hyderabad, but was about a lady journalist who happened to be the arts editor in Delhi in the 1980s and the 1990s,? wrote Jyotirmaya Sharma.
The blog is also smart enough to track the so called ?moles? in bureaus. In a shocking revelation, the blog points its fingure towards an editor who is alleged to have leaked stories to another newspaper. Here is an excerpt from the blog.
?The Editor of the ToI¿s supplement is an ex DC staffer, who wormed her way into Times. Many ex staffers of Times say the lady is hardly seen at work but works hard to tip off DC tabloid editor about stories filed by her team!? (Italics theirs.)
?The most interesting part about Hyderabad media is that everybody knows everybody. There are two types of journalists here so far as English media is concerned. Those who are working in Deccan Chronicle and those who have once worked in Deccan Chronicle. Since most of them shared the newsroom at some point of time or have worked under the common boss, that affinity results in the seamless dissemination of gossips. They share even classified information between eachother although they are part of different organisations now,? says Chetan Mallik, a former journalist.
Since there is a crisis of breaking stories in Hyderabad media, the only option left for journalists is to ?break their own stories?, adds another critic.
A first of its kind venture in the state, the blog which seems to have born out of obvious reasons (read frustration) has so far restricted itself to the top order in media organisations. According to people who are in the know of things, it could be a solid tool for editors to keep tabs on the younger lot in the organisation besides the internal politics and the spicy information that give enough meaning to an otherwise mechanistic affair in a newsroom.