The Formidable Editor, Vimla Patil

Vimla Patil always stressed the importance of proving wrong the perception that women were women's worst enemies.

And it is a lesson I carried forward with me all through my career, learning empathy, understanding and ways to help as I went along.

Sathya Saran, who succeeded Mrs Patil as Femina's editor, pays homage to the well-known journalist who passed into the ages on September 29, 2024.

One of the first stories I heard about Vimla Patil pertained to the early years of her joining the Times Group.

She was among the handful of women in the organisation, if one did not count the secretarial staff I suppose, and carried herself with the assurance of one who knew who she was and what she was destined for.

The story went that when she would at times visit the accounts department, perhaps to respond to some query raised, the entire staff would put down their pens and sigh to themselves as she wafted past in a sari.

I worked at my first job in The Hitavada, a Nagpur paper, with an Editor, G T Parande, who was gentle and funny, full of a boyish sense of adventure.

He taught me the importance of values, integrity, grit and honesty, being a beacon of these values himself.

An editor in Bombay, I worried, would be made of sterner stuff.

By the time I joined Femina, Mrs Patil was a formidable name in journalism.

She helmed a magazine that was pushing the frontiers for women, and even as it had pages on cooking and cleaning and sewing, the magazine would force open closed doors by daring women to embark on new adventures, or asking difficult, sometimes embarrassing questions.

If the first ever assignment handed to me directly by her was to write a cover story on 'How a woman could become an entrepreneur', the second was to do a survey based story on 'Who owns the money women earn.'

The first sent me scuttling into unknown realms with names like SSI, WIMA and SBI to get material to put together the article, which I had been told must have definite guidelines on where women could go for finance, for advice on making profit and loss predictions, and a list of all permissions and steps required to float a proposal to the concerned financing and governemnt authorities.

It had to include real life case studies of women who had indeed started their own businesses, however small. And I had a month to write it.

The second was an eye-opener of another kind. It told me I was one of the lucky few who could control my own earnings, and walk across to the bank down the road from my office to put in the cash my job paid me on pay day.

Ninety percent of the women I interviewed were handing over their cash to their husbands, or mothers-in-law, who would give them 'pocket money' from their earnings.

The two stories, so different one from the other, gave me a clear sight of what Femina was, the world it was part of and the world it wanted its readers to create.

In her own way, thus, Mrs Patil was a feminist. So was Gulshan Ewing, the editor of Eve's Weekly, Femina's only competitor at the time. But both women, while holding their own against the world that was still very much a man’s world, spoke up for women in a variety of ways.

I think the most important lesson I learned in my early years as a sub-editor in Femina, was that women must help women.

Mrs Patil always stressed the importance of proving wrong the perception that women were women's worst enemies. And it is a lesson I carried forward with me all through my career, learning empathy, understanding and ways to help as I went along.

If we were often asked by male readers how we kept working together so well despite being an all-women team, (which was rare in those days except at the two women's magazines), it was because the captain of the ship ensured the waters remained placid and steered the boat with a firm but friendly hand, showing by example.

I remember I ran into legal issues within months of joining. The usual story of a small town, trusting bumpkin searching to buy a house and getting gypped.

My husband had yet to wind up his business and join me (it took him more than two years to pull up his roots) and I had to fend the crisis mostly alone.

She would not click her tongue or resent my absences when I had court hearings, and once when I was close to despair because I needed a large sum of money (by 1980s standard), she took me home in her car, soothed me, and then drove to the bank to withdraw the cash and loan it to me.

Women helping women. Lesson well learned. Never to be forgotten.

Other learning came my way, some disguised as punishments. I think I had been enjoying my early two years as a sub-ed, writing, editing, honing my skills, and generally spending my free hours (husband not around, remember) making new friends, discovering the city, acting in plays, and attending concerts.

Then the bombshell dropped. Mrs Patil handed me a portfolio. Food! I had I thought, managed to kick the kitchen from my life for now... but there I was staring at a file bursting with recipes from readers and being told I had to learn to choose, to format, to test and ensure it was worthy of being cooked and served by other readers with no lawsuits for murder landing at our door.

After two weeks of struggling, I bent under the burden and decided to carry it. Today, I see it as training, one which stood me in good stead.

For when, as we grew as a magazine, the two pages given to food swelled to eight, and I spurred by a calendar from Air India which had delectable food photos, asked if we could have freelancers shoot food, Mrs Patil said, after a moment's thought, "why not?" adding, "But keep costs to a minimum."

To that okay, I credit my learning food styling on the wing, working with photographers like Pankaj Liya and Mukesh Munim who were as eager to see how to create mouth watering magic with food.

Then, when the second thunderbolt was thrown and my comfort food dept was pulled out, (I thought without due warning) from under my feet, the story was repeated. I was handed the fashion portfolio.

I remember the tears of anger I shed in the fourth floor bathroom, then telling myself that clothes were my passion, sailed forth to create a file.

Fashion, till then was two pages of studio pics, and of course Mrs Patil repeated her caution-lined approval to my ideas and the fashion pages took wing.

Another valuable learning that was thrust upon me, which helped Femina grow a facet as the home grown leader among fashion magazines.

I learned from my editor that honey rather than vinegar keeps a team together, though I have been guilty of sometimes mixing acid into the honey in my time, for shirkers.

And to her credit, as Editor she never grudged her staff for expanding their talents, or writing for other in-house publications, delving into theatre or music.

At one point, two of her staffers, my colleague Sohaila Kapur and I, were involved in the same play, and sometimes played truant. Another editor would have placed a ultimatum; but not ours who saw it as individual growth.

I could go on and on, about the good times, the joking and traveling together. There were skirmishes too as the years passed, over innovative covers she disapproved of or some article that 'did not fit in' but not serious enough to break the bond.

Mrs Patil became a friend after I became Femina's editor. She would tell those around proudly, 'This girl is one of mine'! Oh the joy of acceptance!

Why do we wait for a person's death to try and bring them alive again?

We let people who once held their place centre stage in our lives to fade away as the light on them dims, and soon, too soon they are relegated to the backrooms of memory which we visit only when reminded that it is time to wish them on a birthday or an anniversary.

And then, they are gone!

And we remember. Regret, guilt, sorrow, lap at the edge of the memories that come flooding in.

Of a smile, a voice, a guiding hand. And so much that has been and will never be again.

Sathya Saran edited Femina for 12 years.
Aishwarya Rai, Diana Hayden, Yukta Mookey and Priyanka Chopra won Miss World titles while Susmita Sen and Lara Dutta won Miss Universe titles during her tenure as Femina's editor, all first making their presence felt at the Femina Miss India pageant.

Feature Presentation: Rajesh Alva/Rediff.com