DNA Review: This book is a film crying to be made

Media and the Mafia

Ranjona Banerji

TEN pages into Beyond The Newsroom and a huge cinematic screen takes over your mind. The pages fade and you see Ram Gopal Varma’s name bursting on to a screen. Varma only because he has a little gangster film oeuvre. This book is a film crying to be made. Beyond The Newsroom, then, reasserts itself as a book quite quickly. In fact, it’s a racy read. It is also a roman à clef of sorts that lifts the lid on the murky goings-on in the world of newspapers, the police, the underworld and politics. The writer is a journalist, a former crime reporter, and this book has several thinly disguised characters who once ruled the cityscape. The police commissioner, the reporters and editors mentioned, and the underworld don himself are all familiars. Narayan Swamy, Oswald Pereira’s don, is of course, the famous Matunga godfather Vardarajan Mudaliar.

Swamy is an odd mix of criminal and do-gooding social worker, who is himself confused by his two opposing roles. As the novel progresses, Swamy the social worker tries to take control of developments but is always thwarted by Swamy the underworld don. Hell-bent on destroying Swamy is Mumbai police commissioner Donald Fernandez. Known as the supercop, Fernandez is a tough customer who tries every trick he can to end Swamy’s stranglehold over the city.

But although Fernandez has his friends in the media - notably Oscar young Pinto, a crime reporter with “The Newsroom”, India’s most venerable newspaper, Swamy’s ties in the media are stronger, more effective. The political reporter in “The Newsroom”, the crime reporter in the Marathi daily, the business journalist known for his incisive analysis, the beautiful and lethal reporter in Madras - they are all on Swamy’s payroll and use their publications to further his various causes.

The police force, the editor of “The Newsroom”, and the narrator, Pinto, find that Swamy’s people easily run circles around them. The book in fact opens with Pinto’s exclusive story about Swamy’s arrest being proved embarrassingly wrong. Pereira makes a scathing indictment of corruption in newspapers. He details the way articles are planned and stymied and even planted. He also provides fascinating insights into how Swamy’s men infiltrate the media. Shamefully, in real life, Swamy’s formula was successfully repeated by one of India’s leading industrialists who, at one time reportedly had 50 top Indian journalists on his rolls. Pereira explains exactly how this can happen.

However, where the novel falters is when it comes to sustaining the main threads of its story. Pereira begins with the workings of newspapers but later switches completely to Swamy’s operations. Pinto’s character is therefore not developed. And later, Stella Kutty, the beautiful reporter, does not ring true at all. These are minor quibbles. If you want to know about life in Mumbai before the invasion of television and long before Dawood Ibrahim took over, this book is a wonderful ride.

Beyond The Newsroom

Oswald Pereira

Frog Books

Rs 245

255 pages

http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=1100927

Deccan Herald, February 25, 2007

went to town over Beyond the Newsroom and gave it a rave review. Here’s what the newspaper had to say:

"A thriller that can be read at one go."

‘Bad journalists’

M K Chandra Bose

The book reveals the underbelly of the media and is a good read for anyone interested in the news…

IN the eighties when a coterie of reporters in Bangalore were acting as the drum beaters of a chief minister, some of their ilk in Bombay were dancing to the tunes of an underworld don. They included journalists from the lowly tabloids to the mighty national dailies. The unholy nexus between politicians and journalists has been written about but very little is known about the underworld clout with the fourth estate. Beyond the Newsroom fills this void. Truth is often stranger than fiction. Through this work of fiction, journalist Oswald Pereira manages to bring out the bitter truth of what goes behind the news– crime news in particular. It is the horror story of suppression and distortion of news to suit the needs of a mafia don.

The don is Narayan Swamy, the semi-literate bootlegger -turned Bombay’s most dreaded crime lord who manipulates ministers, legislators, criminals, police officers, lawyers and journalists to do his dirty jobs. He has a special liking for journalists as he has found them to be ideal intermediaries. A handpicked triumvirate of journalists including a leading business writer acts as his eyes and ears. It is their job to alert him, to suppress unpalatable news, to intervene on his behalf at the right time and advise him on making his ill-gotten wealth white. Those on his payroll never fail him. His escape to Madras by hoodwinking a posse of 400 policemen makes big headlines.

Not many of the interesting characters are fictitious. The Godfather is modelled on notorious Varadaraja Mudaliar who ruled the Bombay underworld with an iron hand. He built a multi-crore financial empire but wanted to turn over a new leaf. Some of the politicians and the super cop on the don’s trail are easily identifiable. One of the crony journalists has shades of a scribe who writes on Bombay underworld. It is a thriller which can be read at one go. As a novel Beyond the Newsroom is a modest success. It is more like investigative journalism at its best but won’t find a place in any newspaper. The harsh truths tumbling out are severe indictments of a noble profession debauched by unscrupulous scribes. What appears as a scoop is often a plant by some vested interests to serve their ends. Often the reader won’t get the real news as there are journalists willing to hide it for a few pegs of Scotch. Pereira’s expose on the dirty deeds of some black sheep is a timely reminder when the Indian media scene is witnessing a churning process. The book will be of interest to every one who cares for news.

http://www.deccanherald.com/Archives/feb252007/books20512007224.asp