“These newsrooms mould youngsters, right from the start. Camps, led by power centres, take a recruit into their fold. Launch pads take shape owing to subtle manoeuvres. Stories are created and played up. Extra footage is given to the greenhorn until one morning,
when this rookie finds his mailbox flooded with congratulatory messages: starting with a two-liner from the immediate superior, invariably a camp follower of a greater God, endorsed by the greater God, and a still greater God, and so on. Then the creator, destroyer and preserver of the newsroom sign it off, ?Congrats. Keep at it!? Messages start pouring in from bureaus across India?the baptism is over.?”