Madras Press Club alive again!

It is the fortieth year of the founding of the Madras Press Club. It is a matter of satisfaction that it has survived long and could move into a new, more solid premises of its own (courtesy, the SRM Group which has funded the construction).
It was the late 1960s when six Chennai journalists, including this writer, deliberated on setting up the Press Club. After elaborate discussions, the constitution was finalised. Murasoli Maran, then editor of Murasoli, was selected president, V P V Rajan, editor, The Mail and T K Thyagarajan, executive director, The Indian Express as vice presidents. S Vasudevan (Economic Times) as secretary general and this writer as the treasurer. The Hindu did not appear impressed and decided to keep out.

The club was inaugurated by chief minister M Karunanidhi at a function at the Woodlands Hotel. The committee included a good mixture of journalists and non-journalist media-persons and PROs. Committee meetings were held (courtesy the Madras Cricket Club, FACT…) with liberal supply of booze. When the DMK government announced the scrapping of prohibition two years later, the over-enthusiastic members promptly proposed setting up a bar. I was the lone member to point out that the Chennai journalists would not spend much on drinks and as a teetotaller, I would not be equal to maintaining the liquor accounts and resigned as treasurer.

Sadly, my predictions came true; over the next three years, the handsome surpluses accumulated vanished. The premises, given by the government in the Government Estate (The Hut) could not be maintained and even the electrical connection was cut off due to non-payment. Maran was in jail arrested under MISA. Vasudevan was desperate to get out; he got the accounts audited, convened a meeting attended by just a handful (of whom only two were members with up-to-date subscriptions, Vasu and myself). Vasudevan was proposed to close down the club.

I protested, pointing to the enthusiasm with which it was set up and to the wrong approach of focusing on entertainment and not developing it as a vital centre for interactions with leaders of various hues. I took up the challenge and promised to convene a fresh general meeting over the next three months after revamping the club.

With my colleague P S Ramamurti, I got power supply restored and went about organizing meetings in quick succession. Union ministers C Subramaniam and A P Shinde, BHEL’s V Krishnamurthy and NDDB’s V Kurien visited the club in quick succession. Orville Freeman and Yunus Mohammed were some of the other celebrities who attracted large attendance.. MPC was frequently Page One news in the dailies. Membership expanded and The Hindu took notice; K Balaraman acceded to my request to assume charge as a president. C R Ramaswamy (Swadesamitran), Shanmugavel (Makkal Kural), T Rajendran (Kalki), K Krishna Moorthy (The Hindu), S Ramayya (SPIC), T G Nallamuthu (AIR) and myself, among others, were elected to the committee at the general body.

The new Janata government, which assumed power in 1977, was keen to interact with the press soon after taking charge. In March 1977, I organized face to face meetings with George Fernandes, P Ramachandran, L K Advani, Subramanian Swami and Piloo Mody; two months latter in May, prime minister Morarji Desai addressed the Press Club members. It was the first and only time a prime minister addressed the MPC.

My faith in the club functioning as an active centre of news was vindicated. We had a variety of guests from Swami Ranganadananda of the Ramakrishna Mission to Dr Victor Solomon to K Subramaniam. The government was also impressed and provided a much larger premises adjacent to the Kalaivanar Arangam. KB’s close friend, K Krishna Rao of the Woodlands Hotel, provided decree coffee for just Rs. 10 per cup! (In the previous months our costs were kept economical: we used to buy tea at a modest restaurant and a few packets of biscuits and serve these in paper cups and plates. We could contain costs to Rs. 4 per member per month which was the subscription fee!).

KB and I moved out in 1978. The familiar spectacle of infighting started and the club was in a limbo for over a decade. Starting the activity at the new premises with A P J Abdul Kalam and Hindu’s N Ram participating is a good augury. I suggest the current executive team to run the club again as a vibrant news centre.

Elections - arithmetic not so favourable to DMK-Congress

Polling in the first two phases of the elections to the Lok Sabha was over on 23 April. The two national parties, the BJP and the Congress, have suffered desertions by quite a few of their earlier alliance partners.

Ideology has not been the forte of most of the regional political parties. Yesterday’s bitter enemies, Lalu Prasad and Ram Villas Paswan, have come together and are fighting the Congress and JDU. There is also the curious spectacle of these worthies reaffirming the trust in Manmohan Singh as the next prime minister even while attacking the Congress in Bihar and UP.

Facing much tougher competition in their traditional strongholds of Kerala and West Bengal, the Communists are busy building partnerships with several regional parties under a third front.

Election is big business with high stakes. The winner gets it all and the loser none. That explains the no-holds-barred campaigns with liquor and money flowing in torrents. The state election commissioner (TN) Naresh Gupta, expressed serious concern over the free flow of money in the recently held Tirumangalam by-election to the state assembly; but he could not do much about it.

In Tamil Nadu, the Sri Lankan Tamil issue is projected as a major platform. Especially with the Sri Lankan army closing in on the LTTE supremo Prabhakaran, political parties in Tamil Nadu have been busy in their game of one-upmanship.

For the average voter in Tamil Nadu, there are more pressing issues like the acute power shortage, increasing cost of living and lack of employment opportunities. Disappointingly, there is not much focus on these issues and on the worsening state of Tamil Nadu’s finances.

The arithmetic of the alliance appears to have weakened for the DMK-led front. Combined with the anti-incumbency factor, the going appears to be much tougher for the DMK- Congress alliance.

Sections of Tamil Nadu politicians and the film industry have been beneficiaries of their association with prosperous sections of Sri Lankan Tamil business magnates who are sympathetic to the LTTE and who control film distribution in the US and West. Thus these express solidarity with the LTTE. There is thus a lot of emotion, further accentuated by electoral compulsions. One wishes such sentiment is focused on providing food, medicine and other relief to the Sri Lankan Tamils. Sadly, business leaders of the state seem to be more eager to commit huge resources for the IPL circus (Rs 8 crore plus fee for a British cricketer!) and little interested in providing relief to Sri Lankan Tamils.

Lufthansa closes down regional offices…

A couple of months back, Lufthansa German Airlines had closed down its regional offices in Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad. After several decades of hectic activity, the familiar landmark in Mount Road remains closed .

Lufthansa was the first international airline to offer direct non-stop services from Chennai to an European city. The start with two services a week with Airbus 340 aircraft appears quite auspicious. Synchronizing with the boom in air travel triggered by the IT sector, frequency was increased to three and, to five and to seven flights a week; capacity also increased by employing the Boeing 747-400 aircraft. In quick succession daily services were introduced from Bengaluru and Hyderabad. These are apart from the fourteen services a week from Delhi and Mumbai, seven services a week from Kolkata and three from Pune. Lufthansa made excellent use of the favourable bilateral agreements between India and Germany. India and China became major profit centres for Lufthansa.

The flights have been near full, thanks to the convenient connections offered by the airline from Frankfurt to dozens of destinations in Europe, North and South America. But the economic melt down of 2008 has impacted severely on air travel. There has been a fall in the load factor. There is also the ease and familiarity of bookings through the internet; e-ticketing also reduced costs on expensive printing and delivery of the printed tickets. There are also substantial costs on rental space and employee costs. Thus it makes economic sense to close down the offices.

Demise of a fiscal policy expert

In the death of R.J Chelliah the country has lost a renowned expert on fiscal policy. Chelliah had long association with fiscal policy research and administration. Soon after he launched his new economic policy in 1991, Dr. Manmohan Singh as finance minister entrusted the task of reforms of fiscal policy to Chelliah. The Chelliah committee was quick to come out with wide ranging reforms that provided new directions to liberalising the economy. The steep reductions in customs and excise duties and the rationalisation and simplification of these flowed from the rich experience of Chelliah, who headed with distinction, the National Institute for Public Policy and Research. Chelliah advised the state of Tamil Nadu to reform its fiscal policy.

Chelliah also helped A.C. Muthiah set up the Madras School of Economics and headed this for several years. His stature was a vital factor in the quick evolution of MSE.

Tamil Nadu has not produced many experts in the field of applied economics. Chelliah helped meet this deficiency by bringing about the needed focus on applied economic research.