Writing a memoir is an extreme act of arrogance and vanity: Vir Sanghvi

Editor, columnist, TV host and food critic, Vir Sanghvi recently spoke to Dr Annurag Batra, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, BW Businessworld and exchange4media Group about his new book—A Rude Life, in which he turns his dispassionate observer’s gaze upon himself. 

According to Sanghvi, the lockdown forced him to write this book. “I was stuck at home and I was incredibly frustrated and writing was the obvious thing to do. Finally, I decided to write about myself because it's easy. I made few quick rules—make the chapters, the sentences and paragraphs short, and not to make it a long and ponderous book overall.  These are 2000 words -- short snappy chapters.” 

Sanghvi says that writing a memoir is an extreme act of arrogance and vanity.  “You imagine that your life is so important that people want to read about it. And my life is not interesting and nobody wants to read about me.” 

The author says that much of this book is what he has seen rather than about his persona. "There has been criticism that the book does not have a lot of personal stuff, but I was clear that it is going to be about my career and what I had seen in the world”, he explained.  

When asked about the title of the book "The Rude Life", which sounds provocative and intriguing at the same time, Sanghvi shared that it was suggested by his publisher since it alludes to his columns -- Rude Travel and Rude Food. 

“The suggestion was that the book was irreverent in its tone, so 'rude' fit in and the word is frequently associated with me and ultimately it was a marketing decision," said Sanghvi. 

While delving into different chapters in the book, Sanghvi during the conversation also gave a glimpse into his earlier days of journalism. 

“I learned a lot from Aroon (Purie). We learned not to use vague adjectives, and that Khushwant Singh was not the end-all of all good journalism”, shared Sanghvi. 

When asked about his stint at ABP, Sanghvi reminisced: “I accepted the job turning down an extremely good offer from Samir Jain of the Times of India.  I cold-called Aveek Sarkar for the job and I had never been to Kolkata before. It was literally a city that lived in Technicolor at that time.” 

Sanghvi also spoke about his TV journey, especially the NewsX stint, and candidly admitted that he had a conflicting vision that its earlier promoters (Peter Mukerjea and Indrani Mukerjea) never understood. 

“I say in the book that it may never have worked because my vision for the channel was something like 70mm, that had the best reporting, large, and in-depth analysis. If you really wanted to know what was happening, you came to us.  But is that what TV has developed into now? It has now become a place where people are fighting with each other, which is something I could have never done”, he shared. 

When asked about his journey at the Hindustan Times and how he looked back at those years, Sanghvi said he considered himself fortunate to have been associated with the publication during its pivotal moment. 

“It was a leading newspaper in Delhi and it made a certain amount of money but there was a problem. As India changed in 1991, post-liberalisation, people stopped seeing themselves just as readers, they saw themselves as consumers. Someone like Samir Jain saw that shift and turned the Times of India into a market-friendly publication. He also turned it into a professionally run publication. In all this, Hindustan Times remained a bureaucracy and did things the old way. People used to say that HT was the only English Newspaper in the whole world to be written in Punjabi. It was written very badly. No one cared about the quality of the writing,” said Sanghvi 

According to the author, as Delhi was changing so was its middle class, which usually subscribed to Hindustan Times. This led to the rise of more cosmopolitan readers who wanted to read TOI and not HT. 

“Hindustan Times was losing its subscribers and KK Birla reached out to me to know what was wrong with the publication. When I joined HT, we decided to re-orient it completely, and because I had the full backing of the Birlas, I was at the pivotal moment with HT and we were able to turn it around.” 

Having worn various hats with ease, when asked what was next on his list, Sanghvi admits that he has “no grand plans”. 

“As the book indicates, things have always happened to me. I am right now involved in a project which is called ‘Culinary Culture’. It is an attempt to give some shape to the culinary scene in India. I believe that Indian food has never got the respect that it deserves and that is one project that occupies a lot of my attention.” 

“As for the rest, I don’t have a bucket list. Something will come along and I will do it. I’m a little bored of TV at the moment because I think it’s getting difficult to have a sensible conversation on TV”, he explained. 

Towards the end of the conversation, the author was asked to define the “Golden age of journalism”, in his four-decade-long career. He referred to the 90s and the 2000s and the brief period after that. 

“Journalism was growing not just in print but also in TV. People were doing different stories, they were areas that had never been covered before, and everybody could do whatever they wanted. Also, the PMs respected you regardless of what you wrote.” 

In Sanghvi’s view, the combination of political pressure and economic pressure has changed the media forever.