Prabhash Ji- journalist par excellence

It is sheer  coincidence that when India was feeling proud of Sachin Tendularkar’s masterly performance in Hyderabad against Australia in a lost cause, it lost a great Cricket buff, journalist and writer, Prabhash Joshi. Prabhash Joshi was perfectly all right till Sachin was batting, but he started feeling uneasy after Sachin was dismissed and defeat was staring India. That Prabhash Joshi was a great lover of Cricket is a well-known fact to all those who remained reader of Jansatta, the paper he started with great conviction. That Prabhash Joshi has  produced an absolutely cracker of a Hindi newspaper is  now part of the folklore of Hindi journalism.  It is true that has given new grammar to Hindi journalism, both in terms of content and style of writing. Before Jansatta, Hindi newspapers used to prefer Hindi close to ‘Sarkari Hindi’. Very tough and boring. He ensured that Jansatta publish in the language of masses, which is also liked by classes.

A whole generation of journalists grew up following the trend established by Jansatta under the watchful eyes of venerable Joshi. He  picked by his team carefully and then taught them the lessons so that they can produce a different paper. He made many unknown scribes as big brands of journalism. Those who are lucky enough to see the advent of Jansatta in early 80s or to be more precise 1983, would vouch that it was a rage in those days.  It was inarguably the first Hindi newspaper published from capital to enter the drawing rooms of middle class people. Those were the  heady days when Jansatta started its memorable journey. The nation was under the grip of Punjab and Assam movements. The Khalistan movement was at its peak. And within one year of its  journey, the nation had seen Operation Blue star as well as the  killing of Indira Gandhi and later gory anti-Sikh riots. Who would forget the bold and in-depth coverage of Jansatta of those momentous events. I still remember very vividly that on the day Indian Army stormed inside the Golden temple to flush out the Sikh terrorists, Prabhash Joshi has written a first page editorial in praise of Mrs.Indira Gandhi and Indian Army for giving befitting response to anti-national elements. And when Sikhs were massacred in Delhi after the killing of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, Jansatta led from the front to expose the elements behind the senseless killings. Big events apart, Joshi ji always ensured that Jansatta give space to various movements that are going on in remote parts of the country. And he was perhaps the first Hindi journalist to understood the importance of sports. Jansatta was the first Hindi paper to give full page on sports. Much later other papers followed it. When people talk about him, they only discuss his contribution as a Hindi journalist. Not many people are aware of the fact that he was equally comfortable in English, So far so, he edited and started the Chandigarh edition of The Indian Express. The likes of Shekhar Gupta, present Editor in Chief of Indian Express, Devender Sharma, internationally acclaimed writer and journalist on Agricultural affairs and Pradeep Magazine, eminent Cricket writer and journalist, too have started their career under his tutelage in Chandigarh.

And this tribute piece on him would be incomplete if I would not talk brief about his weekly column ‘kagad kare’. In the very vibrant editorial room of Dainik Hindustan  of 80s and 90s, we used to discuss it for hours to together. Prabhash ji, we would dearly miss you. RIP.