Krishan Kalra
Devinder Seth is a successful chap - at least by the usual yardsticks of society. A fairly senior business executive enjoying all the frills of a high profile corporate job - decent salary, furnished house, car and chauffeur, entertainment and foreign jaunts. An accomplished wife and smart children making up the family, it is an enviable existence by any reckoning.
Occasionally, he dabbles in creativity through little harmless forays into writing, speaking, photography, etc. To his credit are minor successes like letters to the editor or an article here and there, mostly in professional journals. The scrap book, however worthless, keeps getting thicker. A few well-prepared talks are repeated with monotonous regularity in different fora. Even with the usual clichés and borrowed lines these speeches did not exactly make him a forceful orator. Then the same talks would be typed out as articles and sent to all possible publications - unmindful of the pile of rejection slips.
Secretly he envied all those prolific speakers at the management seminars - the ease with which they delivered long talks, their seemingly effortless participation in panel discussions and extempore addresses. He thought a lot about those lucky authors whose charming little pieces appeared as middles in the major dailies. Their style, the fluidity of words and phrases, the subtle humour were all so distant, so ethereal to him. Then there were the regular contributors to the financial papers - writing scientifically researched articles on issues of national importance. His greatest desire was to become a prolific writer one day. But he knew it would remain just a dream.
Then something happened. The editor of a well known glossy met him at a party and agreed to look at one of his professional articles. She even asked for several colour transparencies. Our budding writer-cum-photographer was in seventh heaven. The write-up related to rural life. Several rolls of film were exposed; early morning visits to the countryside, furious hunt for the right shots, consultations with friends regarding technically superior pictures, snubs from rural women misunderstanding the motives were all part of the game. Somehow the job was completed and the article with slides was sent to the magazine’s editor. As if by magic, it actually appeared in print a few months later.
There was no end to our hero’s joy. He started day- dreaming. His ambition now didn’t appear all that distant, it seemed within reach. He was going to make it. A sense of happiness enveloped him as he sat in his office contemplating the vistas opening up.
He saw the announcement of a photo-feature, in a popular fortnightly, inviting black and white pictures depicting ‘India with a touch of humour’. The first few issues carried pictures by celebrated photographers - they all looked so simple. Suddenly his passion was black and white photography.
Traffic intersections, birth control hoardings, ‘dabba brigade’ - poor people going to answer the call of nature in open air – monkeys, bears with trainers, bullock carts…everything looked typically Indian and humorous. Twenty enlarged pictures were duly dispatched and next thing he saw was a letter accepting all of them. They even decided to publish these in a special edition with accolades for the budding new photo-journalist - a new force on the scene - someone to be watched.
All of a sudden there were requests pouring in for his photo essays, offers to commission him for special projects. Even some international magazine wrote to ask for contributions to be paid @ $500 per picture. What came next was even better. He was much in demand at various management workshops. His talks were greatly appreciated - full of witty remarks and appropriate anecdotes.
He talked practical sense, not the bookish stuff of those visiting professors. His speeches were quoted. His articles generated tremendous response and debate. There were no more rejection slips. He was invited to many panel discussions on TV and commanded respect. Business schools vied with each other to include him on their faculty.
Then he was writing middles for newspapers. Their well-known authors were no longer distant heroes. They were his fellow writers. His pieces were actually better; infinitely more interesting, urbane and literary. He had arrived. He had become a writer.
Suddenly he was jolted from his pleasant reverie. His phone was ringing incessantly. It was his wife calling from home - another bunch of rejections had arrived and she wanted to know when he was going to give up this madness!
(A veteran of the corporate world, the author now does only voluntary work in various spheres. Views expressed are personal)
