`News Chase’: A novel on the thrills, frills and perils of news reporting

by Thomas Kannamala

BOOK REVIEW   By P S Joseph, Former Editor, India Today (Malayalam)

`Customer is always wrong, especially when dealing with traffic cops,’ writes former crime reporter Thomas Kannamala in his novel `News Chase’.

I am inclined to believe him. He ought to be right, because, a major portion of his career as a crime reporter was spent with cops.

Before I proceed with this review of the novel, some inside information, about the author Thomas Kannamala, aka  K M Thomas.

Nearly for a year, police teams regularly used to deliver crime records from the police archives to Kannamala.  The Tamil Nadu government, on the initiative of the then Additional Director General of Police Ms Archana Ramasundaram IPS, had granted permission to publish a compendium on the evolution of the State criminal investigation department, and major crimes that it had investigated.  Kannamala had agreed to assist the police to edit major crime stories on record. 

He had later confessed to me during a meeting at the Chennai Press Club: `My interest in undertaking the job was to create a private collection of old records for myself.’

The novel on the thrills, frills and perils of news reporting, takes off when Rajiv Menon, deputy chief reporter of the India Mail group of Newspapers, discovers a classified crime dossier of recent origin among the century old police records.

Only later, he came to know that the Inspector General of Police (CID) had deliberately planted it to check if the investigative reporter Menon would dare to open even a classified document in his quest for news.

The top cop had a special script and plan.

Now, after reading the 300 odd page novels, I am certain that the news peg `the dossier plant’ among the crime record had occurred to the author, while editing the old crime stories for the compendium, which was released by the then chief minister M.Karunanidhi.

A new colour and depth has been introduced to many of the real life incidents in the novel with his different roles as the crime reporter of a leading national newspaper, the president of Chennai press club, and a guest teacher of journalism course.

We both had been career journalists for over three decades in the same area, and had first-hand information about many of the episodes that appeared in the novel.

Our paths crossed several times. Sometimes I have followed up his stories and collaborated on reporting them. I am happy to see his experience as a real life journalist has come to fruition in this facto-fictional novel News chase.  

I too have reported some of these stories and know how truthfully the author has chased it till the end, with amazing diligence.

What strikes me most in the book is the way it is being presented. (Please read the sample at the end of this review). 

My love affair with the Perry Mason type of fiction comes handy here. Kannamala writes real experiences as a story in straight forward prose with such a neat drama so that we could read as if it were all fiction. He likes to call it facto-fictional and tries to avoid the heroics, and bragging associated with some real incidents which had happened and well documented.

I would have loved to have a Della Street, the beautiful secretary of Perry Mason, to assist the indefatigable writer on pursuit of news but he likes to be presented as a solo reporter and not adventurous like James Bond on suicidal missions. He writes on real life experiences, news breaks, the meticulous way he has dealt with crimes, how he cultivated sources and how he benefited with their support. 

A useful reference book for journalism aspirants as well.

What makes him stand out is his uncompromising stand on issues and kindness to share news sources especially controversial ones. The chapter on reporter Gunalan describes how easy and tempting it is for similar characters with high level contacts to end up as blackmailers – a standing threat to the reporter fraternity these days. 

Kannamala surreptitiously looks into this world calmly and passively. His aim is to bring in the details as a journalist views it and how incidents, insights, gut feeling and experience bring in remarkable follow up of events, as it happened in the Meenambakkam airport bomb blast case.

Though facto fictional, News Chase is a first-hand narration of events behind the headlines.

The book is replete with several incidents, hilarious, comic and tragic. They include the death of a child after a scorpion in the shoe stung him, why the cub reporter who reported it lost his job, exposure of chit fund fraud, drunken pilots, headless ghost, export scams and herbal petrol.

It is the twist and spins in the narration that keep this book a compulsive read.

The News Chase is in keeping with the spirit of his delightful area focused news weekly tabloid `Harrington Post’ which he used to edit and publish.

A common thread that connects the journalists, the policemen and the judiciary is the frustration with the system that encompasses them over a period of time, as brought out clearly in the `muster roll scam’, and its hilarious ending.

The book is a thriller, a narrative of the times and really a guide book to the reporters who want to know how to pursue news stories instead of pontificating on it.

What is astonishingly evident in News Chase is that even after centuries, the face of the crime has not changed except for the vastness of the looted amount.  The same methods are used, the same way the society and the public offices are plundered and the big sharks get away.

Among the fact-category, the stories relating to the Fake Bond scheme, Headless human body, Fraud in Public Service Commission, Airport Blast, Herbal Petrol, Chit Fund deception and Muster Roll scam are particularly impressive.

The scorpion sting story is a message to cub reporters, who court disaster in their immature haste to produce `scoops’.

The author was a guest teacher of journalism which also colours his view of the events. 

As I read it, I could visualise the real characters clad in fictional wrap. For thriller-fans, this is book is a real treat which has taken shape out of experience. It is an exposure of the exciting, but at times perilous world of news gathering, and reporting it, possibly for the first time in English by an Indian author with hands-on experience.

News Chase is the first book of Kannamala, based on his frequent swimming with big sharks and small fish alike but he deals with it in a very dispassionate and refreshing way for the reader. 

For the journalist and media it’s a veritable treasure trove of information which is practical and more useful than pontificating colourlessly.

Regarding the novel itself, I have no hesitation to say that it is a magnificent effort to place caution boards for those who imagine that news reporting is fun, as portrayed in films, and TV serials. 

At a time, when print media is debating existential questions, the book has a powerful message to journalism aspirants. 

Menon’s key note address in the epilogue to the journalism students, passing out from the JKR University, is a master piece to be read every day by anyone who wished to enter this profession.

 The exposure of the author for over 35 years as a newsman, editor, publisher, teacher and leader of the press club shine through the entire book. It was an enjoyable experience for me, revisiting the old world in new colours. 

Appended below is a sample page for the readers delight.

TO READ THE NOVEL `NEWS CHASE' IN PDF FORMAT, PL SMS NEWS CHASE TO 9840036084