witty Balan (Chief Sub), my friend Patrick Michael
(a gifted Malayalee who, with me, but surreptitiously,
covered North Goa for The Current Weekly -- together we
had done the Siddarth Bandodkar shooting story, but who K.S.K.
ensured stayed as Proof Reader without promotion at
the NT!) Gabru and Cyril D'Cunha were at the desk and
Gurudas R. ("Kaka") Singbal, Pramod Khandeparkar and
Jovito Lopes on the field?

For reasons that will take me off this track, I
declined the offer. Promising Dr. K.S.K., however, that
I'd join the day I complete graduation -- though I
never really meant to take journalism as a career. I
had set my sights on becoming a Company Secretary after
B.Com. but while doing the correspondence course,
thought I'd work -- and earn pocket money.

The '70s were times of MRTP culture. There were
monopolies and there were restrictive trade practices,
and Commissions that could barely hold them in check.
Even though Dr. K.S.K. to my sheer amazement once
bragged that the Prime Minister's private secretary
telephoned him while he was shaving just that morning
(to compliment him on the day's "excellent" editorial),
fact was that NT rarely traveled 35 kilometres to Margao
before 8 or 9 in the morning. Times wouldn't change
and the NT stood still. It was a proud monopoly, which,
after all, had weathered challenges from the likes of
Goa Monitor (Papa Baba Sequeira-owned, Jagdish Rao
-published, Mario Cabral Sa-edited and Alfred De Tavares
-chief reported.)

Back to the summer of 1978. As our 'unholy trinity' of
Aleixo, Shekhar and me daily sat at the Govind Poy
house on Abade Faria Road, Margao, preparing for our
final B.Com. exams, I missed Kaka Singbal -- a.k.a.
Balsing, the Sunday columnist and Chief Reporter of NT
-- and Sripad P. Madkaikar, who at one time or the
other published most of Goa's dailies. Both had called
at home earlier in the day. Kaka left a note saying he
had something "interesting" for me and would I kindly
see him soon. I met him at his Patto quarters early
next morning. He said he had quit NT and joined a
newspaper that was going to be published -- from
Margao! He said the proprietor, Panduronga (Chalebab) Timblo
-- Papa to most of us -- had made a blanket offer:
whatever the NT offered me, he would offer more!

I immediately went to Navhind Bhavan. Dr. K.S.K. was
seated with Fr. Lactancio Almeida, then Editor of
Vauraddeancho Ixtt. I explained that it would help me
cope with