THE NEWS BEHIND THE NEWS

The gibbous moon is carving its way through the darkness and the night is still poised on the verge of morning. Some people are coming back having done their night shifts and the sounds of passing vehicles seem nibbling at the silence. The time is 3:30 am and the sun will arise after 2 hours but for Aftab, the sun has been rising at the same time for the last 20 years, who is waiting for the cab, which is expected to come with newspapers at Batala House bus stop. He owns a newspaper stall in the same vicinity. The things have changed enough and keep changing by now. He had seen small homes spiraling up into sky scrappers, a phenomenon that has much to do with his profession for he is a hawker as well. “ Earlier it was problematic enough to ascend the stairs of every building so I developed this trick” says with a smile the man who has become a sure shot of throwing news papers into admired balconies “ but here you can’t grow for most of the people live in rented accommodations and keep shuffling their homes that results in the loss of my money” his words are flanked by a frayed smile that shows the resentment he has been harboring with in. But in this era of information technology when mobile phones have become the one of the most essential feature of life, he must keep the contact numbers of his customers “ yes.. I do but they do not bother to receive my call. They will call me if I am late” retorts the person who originally hails from Gorakhpur district of U.P. and is a dropout of school after 5th standard. To what extent the mushrooming of 24 hours news channels has affected his business? “ Not at all, nothing can replace the power of written words” answers the person who has never come across any English newspaper in his life. But for Surendra Prakash Sharma , who owns a stall in Krishna Nagar and is an authorized dealer of Hindi daily Amar Ujala , it is not an idea to concur with and according to him electronic media has affected his business to some extent “ there was a time when people would come every morning to buy newspapers but the present situation is no match to that time” says Sharma who has been in the business for the last 32 years. He recalls the days when he used to earn 200-300 rupees every month. So how much he earns now? “ Blessings are of the God…dal roti chal rahi hai”, a fact he is too willing to discuss about. But Ahtesham, a student of 12th standard who delivers newspapers in Abul Fazal Enclave, comes forth with a terse reply “ 700 rupees only. Besides it I get some money whenever I am offered to deliver the pamphlets with newspapers”. Is he satisfied with this little amount of money? “ See bhai sab I am getting late. I have much work to do” he moves ahead.