Chennai: Internships in a media house play a vital role for budding journalists. For that, I must be the most gifted person, who got a chance to do internship in ‘News Today‘ in 2001 and got a job at the fag-end of 2002.
Those were the days when getting internship in a media house in Chennai was a Herculean task as only three English papers hit the stands and among them, ‘News Today‘, was the only eveninger.
Unlike other papers, here the interns get a free hand to know about both reporting and editing. They accompany reporters to assignments. They are also encouraged to do stories and ‘News Today‘ is always happy to give bylines to encourage the budding journalists.
As media studies gained momentum, the number of students doing internship also went up, where we had to accommodate more than 20 of them at one go. There were interns not only from across Tamilnadu, but also other States.
They were given first-hand information on how the newspaper works and they were assigned stories.
Of late, it is not just journalism and literature students too are our interns / staff. At ‘News Today‘, we have many engineering graduates working as reporters and sub-editors.
We have a well-defined team that too youngsters in the editorial section, right from top to bottom. So, with young blood, they rise to the occasion and are energetic under the supervision of senior hands.
The youngsters specialise in their particular fields – be in automobiles, cinema, health or crime.
A few have gone a step further, where our senior journalist M Bharat Kumar is active in participating in debates on television and a few trying their luck in the cine field.
One of our former staff, Anu Sathya has come out with a short film – ‘Naangaam Vidhi‘ and there will be a grand premiere 9 December at Sathyam Cinemas, Royapettah. Also, Kishore Sankar, who was with us early is now working as an assistant director in Tamil cinema.
‘News Today‘ is also happy to share that one of our interns has acted in a movie that was a super hit. In the film ‘96‘, the younger version of Trisha (Janaki Devi) is Gouri G Kishan, who did her internship with us this May.
She has become an instant celebrity. Though she says in her interviews she wants to become a good journalist, she has already bagged a Malayalam film. Our interview with Gouri is still getting traction on our website.
Many other interns / journalists have gone on to helm other newspapers in senior positions. So, looking for a bright future in journalism? Drop in at our office in Guindy.