ners of Goa, who rarely witnessed the hectic
activity at the news desk, moments before the deadline.
On numerous occasions, news items placed on the page
had to be removed at the last moment to accommodate
late advertisements. As such, rural reports, no matter
how essential, simply couldn't find the space in newspaper.

Moreover, many correspondents are convinced that their
news items are more important than the others, so much
so that they cannot bear to find their reports delayed
even by a day. Quite often, their unhappiness over the
delay in printing their reports would become more vocal
with each passing day and, invariably, I became their
punching bag. This was largely because some of the
rural correspondents are considered important members
of the public in their locality and, at times, their
prestige and financial gains in journalism would often
be at stake with a delayed publication of their reports.

It must be admitted that over the years, journalism has
been turned into a prestigious and lucrative part-time
option for many of the rural correspondents. A few
years ago, a former editor mentioned to me that he was
on a trip to a remote village in Goa, when he decided
to attend a function in the locality. The place was
packed to capacity and he was forced to stand behind
occupied chairs. To his surprise, the chief guest
happened to be the local correspondent of his own newspaper!

This enthusiasm towards 'extra-curricular' activities
sometimes translates into political affiliation. In a
recent event which established the BJP-journo nexus in
Sanguem, a correspondent with a Marathi newspaper and
member of the Sanguem Patrakar Sangh was been
unanimously elected president of the Sanguem Unit of
the BJP. Similarly, the president of the Sanguem
Patrakar Sangh and a correspondent with an
English-language newspaper, was appointed the BJP booth
president of Tarimol-Sanguem. In most cases, reports
sent by correspondents to the news desk, in the past,
specially when there was no one in particular to look
after this responsibility, simply lacked form and
content. Illegible words either scribbled on scraps of
paper or sent as distorted faxed messages were among
the most popular methods deployed to communicate their
reports. In some cases, only a skilled pharmacist could
decipher the words used by some correspondents. Under
such conditions, the sub-editor assigned to such
reports had the arduous task of converting t