In it, he proceeded to say that the new newspaper would convey the views of the Marathi Gomantak in English. It was a ridiculous claim; but something that the new newspaper took years to live down. This proved to be a real gift to the paper's rivals, which they exploited to good effect.
The early days with GT were fun, because most people didn't give us much of a chance. Our staff resources too were meagre. There was Pramod Khandeparker, who was the Assistant Editor but was more of a chief reporter; and a retired English professor M.N. Pal as news editor — who spent a few months with us — and G.K. Mohan Nair, the ToI sub.
Ex-Herald colleagues included Francis Ribeiro. And among the trainees was my good friend Vidya Heble. But most of the staff were raw and we stumbled along in those early days. The first year passed with GT barely making a dent. I believe that the paper's circulation barely exceeded a few hundred copies. And as the second anniversary approached, Mr Mohan Rao was preparing to say his goodbye. He original brief was to set up the paper and leave after two years.
This set the stage for Ashwin Tombat to take charge of the paper. And immediately we began to see a dramatic change in the paper's fortunes. Of course, we were helped along by the Narvekar molestation scandal. But to be fair, it's not the issue that matters, but how you handle it. If we did manage to raise our circulation it was because of our reporting. Some in media, did take exception to the fact that we named the girl.
But I feel it was needed then, specially if you have are up against a powerful political figure. For those who still doubt this view, I can only point to the way the Miramar sex scandal died down without the guilty being brought to book. However, one is not suggesting that the victim in sex abuse cases should be named. The only reason I have raised this issue is to explain why the girl was named.
Sorry for digressing; but another turning point in the history of paper came in 1993 when we were faced with a contempt notice from the Supreme Court. Sadly, this proved to me that whatever a management tells you, if you get into trouble you face it alone. In the case in question, we were hauled up for what was taken to be a suggestion, in a cartoon, that a Supreme Court judge was being bribed to adjourn a hearing in a case related to the disqualification of then chief minister Ravi Naik.
How I got involved in the matter — even though it was my day off — is another matter. But the real icing on the cake was that what the court claimed we had suggested in the cartoon apparently was the truth. Unknown to us then, a colleague in our sister newspaper had apparently tried to bribe a judge. But the deal had fallen through because the judge wanted more money than the politician was willing to pay. The story came out when the journalist apparently did not return all the money that he was given by politician and claimed he had incurred "expenses".
Ravi Naik ultimately resigned, ironically after himself losing an appeal against his disqualification in the Supreme Court; and I was cleared of contempt charges.
Two years later I left GT.
But the memories remain.