Off beat track pays off to Gujarat journalist

Dilip Patel is among senior journalists covering secretariat for the last 13 years. But much of his writing is the reflection of his nose for the off beat. And it has paid him off well.
He wrote some articles about Gandhi. It was much before film Munnabhai revived interest of people in Gandhi and his ideology. This attracted the attention of a NGO promoting Gandhi and Dilip won a 22 day tour to South Africa in 2004.
He saw different places associated with Gandhi in South Africa and also participated in a 300 km long walk through Gandhian places. He and one other journalist were selected from media in this international tour.
Certainly, it is a great achievement from personal and professional point of view. For quite sometime Dilip is planning to write a book about his journey. But as usual pressing assignments are delaying his diary of South Africa. At a personal level, he witnessed the glory of an era that was Gandhi.
His writings about forest and environment and archaeological places attract reader's attention at the first sight. Many of his stories are picked up by the national media. He says political beat is his duty and off beat writing is his passion. During quarter century of his career he has worked with number of
Gujarat newspapers.
Dilip is a person who follows his convictions and conscience, something becoming rare in the journalism. At times, he is sticking to his views to give a feel of obstinate rigidity to others. He minces no words while expressing his dissent. His one liner dissents convey him well with the punch of brevity.
But if you know him, he is quite sensitive. One of his favorite pastimes is to produce Ayurvedic preparations to be distributed to friends. He has tested prescriptions for hair oil, tooth powder and chyawanprash. He himself prepares it and gives it to friends on no profit basis. Labour is free as love labour. He says that his preparations were becoming popular but time was a big constraint!!
This aspect of his personality has an interesting story. He was searching for some kind of preparation to be used as a stress buster. Something every journalist wishes. He tried many and found a hair oil preparation as the best. Since then, he is using it and preparing it for friends.
One day one of his relative wanted a video cassette of a swamiji about Pranayaam. He played the CD in his computer to test whether it is working or not. He was attracted by the Pranayaam techniques. This turned him towards Yoga and Pranayaam.
Recently, when Ahmedabad chapter of the Public Relations Society of India decided to introduce Journalist of the Year Award, Dilip attracted the jury for his convictions and off beat track. He was presented the first PRSI Journalist of the Year Award on Monday.
Dilip Patel is basically from Gujarati journalism. He is presently a senior staff of Ahmedabad Mirror of midloid clan of Times Group.

Cama is the new chairman of India section of CPU

Hormusji N Cama, Director, Bombay Samachar, and immediate Past President of the Indian Newspaper Society (INS) has taken over as the new Chairman of the Indian Section of the Commonwealth Press Union (CPU) with immediate effect. He succeeds K. N. Shanth Kumar, Director of Deccan Herald Group of Newspapers, Bangalore. The Bombay Samachar is the oldest newspaper in Asia and has had a long relationship with the CPU.
Hormusji Cama is a Director of Press Trust of India (PTI). Press Council of India has recently re-nominated him for a second term as the President. He was the President of Indian Language Newspapers Association (ILNA), for one term.

In the blog powered land

Last week Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi had couple of non government engagements in Delhi. One of them was his felicitation by Gujarati Samaj. Our friend Nilesh Shukla who looks after Gujarat's media relations in Delhi for more than a decade asked Delhi media to cover the function.
However, at the venue it was chaos. No arrangement for media. Oraganisors checked media like sleuths. Confrontation was the natural outcome. Friends pulled all strings. Nilesh was at the airport. However, friends managed entry using BJP headquarters contacts.
Inside, trouble began afresh. Friends and fans of Modi began protesting the position of cameramen. They shouted and yelled. We do not want you, was the cry. Media persons looked around. Modi was very much settled on Dias.
They could not make out whether Modi was looking at them or he had a blank stare. They retreated in protest. But there was none to stop him. Certainly there could be no worse instance of humiliation of invited media.
All knew that there protests would meet the same fate in their own office. No one would take note of what happened with them. But Yashwant Singh who is associated with a blog Bhadas was prompt to put the matter on his blog in his own way within two hours of the incident. He also predicted that the protest issue would not appear anywhere.
The blog is a network of more than 250 media men. Daily, hundreds hits are registered on this blog. I also got to know about the incident from here only.
While surfing the same blog, I came across another post on the same day.
It was a resignation letter of a staffer of IANS Swatantra Mishra. It had outburst against the Executive Editor of the Hindi section of the IANS Arun Anand.
Some may find such an action improper. Here the merit of the case is not a point. But the power of blog is evident. It is a great leveler which has given power to anyone and everyone with connectivity. In a fast moving world this is a way to raise voice against those who are at higher platforms.