The WhatsApp Stringer: in Nalbari, Assam

Road from highway to Nalbari town

This assignment was worked out to converse with journalists in cities, towns and in the districts. Though I can meet only a few in every state that I visit, even these meetings can reveal much.

From Guwahati (in Assam) I take a taxi and head to Nalbari, some 70-plus kms to the east. Minutes outside the state's capital, we are on a giant bridge across the mighty Brahmaputra river flowing southwards, with some barges on it this morning.

Alongside, the hilly terrain runs a vast camp of the Indian Army and beyond, the quiet rural landscape.

We turn left off the highway, into Nalbari and on the one kilometer stretch, I notice at least five large billboards with prime minister Narendra Modi beaming at you. Electric rickshaws alone are allowed to ply inside the town, its main road abuzz this morning.

I have made contact with Manoj Sarma of 'Dainik Asom' daily and he asks me to be at the gate of the collectorate. Out of the crowd emerge two men and you know they are hackers!

Mazid (left) and Sarma at a restaurant: the WhatsApp page active on their smartphones

We adjourn to a popular restaurant because Manoj and his community of stringer journalists work from home and the local Press Club has got a new address at the city square but the place isn't ready yet - the doors, windows and all else are being fitted now.

Sarma is keen to take me down the past - to a local reporter's work life in the outbacks. "We used to write our reports on paper and fax them. But getting the line connected took over 30 minutes. Then we used couriers to send reports ( to Guwahati) or send them and photos by bus. In the 80s, the phone lines were bad so it was a struggle to report breaking news."

Abdul Mazid joins us at the table here; he strings for a couple of dailies ( 'Dainik Agradoot' and 'Eastern Chronicle') and runs his own printing press. Everybody who works as a Stringer in the districts here is either running a business or selling insurance or engaged in retail business.

Sarma and Mazid now own laptops and since the lines are good, filing from home is easy. "But most of us simply file from our phones if the news is a few lines and if photos have to be sent. All by WhatsApp, " Sarma tell us as chai is ordered and two more Stringers join us.

A newspaper shop in Nalbari, and the clutch of dailies of the day

Nalbari has about 20 media people; with some 14 working for newspapers and the rest for TV channels. Across this district, Sarma estimates that over 100 Stringers provide news to their clients.

Kamlesh Sarma who works for 'Asomiya Pratidin' here says they click pictures or record interviews to store as evidence - evidence to use if stories are challenged. And those challenges come from this town and from people who are written about.

"At election time we send two or three stories every day and if there is an event or a rally, we send photos. Our newspapers use them in the local editions. But our big grouse is on payment. Even the MNREGA payment made to people who work for the state is higher than what we sometimes get," says one of them.

Town square, with the Press Club on the top floor of the central building

Sarma and his colleagues take me to a bookstore when I ask to buy all the local dailies of the day. They then insist that I take the two storeys to their under-construction Press Club. They shoot a photo of myself in their group.

The next morning, in Guwahati I find that photo and a 4 line news story in one of the dailies.

I have made local news!