The story of Hindustan Samachar

 

Baleshwar Agrawal of Hindustan Samachar being felicitated by PM Vajpayee

NK SINGH

In the turbulent period of 1948, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh decided to sponsor an all-India political party and an all-India news agency to be able to build adequate political strength for the realisation of its dream of "Hindu Raj" in the country.

However, it was envisaged that none of the proposed two organisations should have any formal connection with the RSS though both should help each other and be indirectly controlled by the parent organisation.

Thus, the Hindustan Samachar came into being in 1948 -- two years before the RSS debut in the political arena -- with some trusted swayamsewaks like S.S. Apte and Dharmvir Gandhi as the moving spirit. 

To camouflage its birthmarks, it was registered as a private limited company in Bombay under M. C. Sharma. 

Though he played a crucial role in getting the ban on the RSS lifted, Sharma became disgusted with the RSS functioning in the news agency and resigned. With his resignation, skeletons started falling off the HS cupboard. 

The RSS bosses saved the agency by converting it into a cooperative society mainly of its journalist employees in 1957. On the face of it, the shareholding was widespread but most of it was confined to RSS people. 

On the other hand, its appearance as a cooperative venture helped the HS to secure many special favours, facilities and concessions, including sizeable financial aid from the Union and State Governments and other public bodies. 

Fifty per cent of the news agency's income comes from government sources -- the All India Radio and State governments.

Thus working in the garb of a cooperative society, this RSS-controlled news agency made rapid growth and by 1962 it had one hundred-odd subscribers. 

It grew rapidly particularly because the member-employees were all devoted missionary workers of the RSS interested in building the news agency to further their ideological goal.

Its spectacular growth provided a big boon to the Jana Sangh as no other political party in India had a news agency at its command to publicise its policies, programme and activities. 

The net result was that the party emerged as a powerful political force within 12 years of its existence. Growing with the help of the Hindustan Samachar and RSS cadre, Jana Sangh freely used its political influence to further strengthen its two allies. 

This caused concern among the other political parties who sent representations cautioning the government against giving aid and showing favour to the HS which existed for a purely political purpose and functioned mainly to further the interest of Jana Sangh and RSS.

The representations received the attention of the government. It alerted the management which decided to recruit some non-RSS men in the organisation -- just for window dressing. Several appointments were made on this line.

But in 1970 the then Union Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting publicly announced that the four major news agencies in India were proposed to be made public corporations. 

This new policy of the government brought about re-thinking. The Hindustan Samachar management started throwing out all non-RSS employees, one by one, so that the news agency could once again be turned into an RSS stronghold by the time it was made a public corporation.

The management started vexing and harassing the non-RSS staff which led to the formation of a union of the employees -- Hindusthan Samachar Karamchari Sangh. Oddly enough, this was the first union of HS employees formed after 23 years of its birth.

The formation of the union further provoked the management and the harassment and subtle victimization increased day by day. 

While several were forced to resign, some were retrenched on one pretext or the other. SS Sathe, Sharad Dwivedi, R.S. Joshi, Kaul, Bansal and Brahmanand Mishra are the glaring examples of this policy.

One of the notable victims of the policy of purging the non-RSS employees was Bimal Kumar of HS Patna Bureau. He had joined the news agency in 1968 along with a score of non-RSS men. 

The case of Bimal Kumar

Kumar, who could never pull on well with the RSS henchmen in the HS owing to his leftist leanings, further displeased the bosses by contesting the 1971 mid-term poll from Patna as a Revolutionary Socialist Party of India (Marxist- Leninist) nominee, while the then General Secretary of the Bihar state Jana Sangh, Kailash Pati Mishra, was contesting from the same seat.

In the meantime, the Bangladesh revolution broke out. According to Kumar, explosive telegraphic messages containing imaginary stories calculated to excite communal passions started pouring in from Kishanganj, a border town, where one of the prominent office-bearers of the local Jana Sangh unit worked as the HS correspondent. 

In his editorial capacity, Kumar either killed or drastically edited the dispatches, which enraged the then managing editor of Patna Bureau, AP Keshari. A hot exchange of words followed between the two persons.

Consequences followed. 

The Hindusthan Samachar management decided to suddenly transfer Bimal Kumar to Nagpur insisting that he should join his duties there on July 7, 1971. It was aware of the fact that Kumar was appearing for LLB examination of the Bhagalpur University which was to commence from July 12, 1971. 

Naturally, Kumar protested and made great efforts to stop the transfer. But the bosses would not listen. Kumar did not go to Nagpur and as planned by the management, he was dismissed.

SECULAR DEMOCRACY

June 1972