Sir,

The book, Star of Mysore­ —  Story of a unique evening english newspaper, sent to me with KBG’s signature is a book I treasure. I convey my deep appreciation of the book which I completed reading in one sitting.

The saga of KBG’s struggle to remain afloat for 40 years in an extremely competitive journalism and make a success of it despite tremendous odds is something at once fascinating and daunting.

At the same time it is a tribute of triumph of human spirit to persevere and endure that kept my attention unflagged till I completed reading the book. What has embellished was KBG’s unique journalistic style, a mixture of simplicity, directness, honesty and frankness that is at once endearing and captivating.

Needles to say the photographs as always a silent witness to KBG’s journey of forty years has made the book attractive.

In the Epilogue he has rightly referred to the advice of Ferdinand Megallan, Portuguese explorer:  “The sea is dangerous and its storm terrible and these obstacles have never been sufficient reason to remain ashore.”

This brings to my mind the saga of Madhu Nagaraj, a gentle and shy neighbourhood boy who had his baptism in swimming in our Saraswathipuram Swimming Pool and has now become the toast of the world in extreme sports in open water swimming and his acme of achievement was swimming in Megallan Straits during November 2017 under subzero condition, unknown danger from aquatic creatures and with giant waves and wind speed of 180 knots. When he completed he lost consciousness and had to be revived.

The other attractive feature is KBG’s Abracadabra. Again I can compare to what the infinity man Ramanujan says about his fascination for Mathematics:

“An equation for me has no meaning, unless it expresses a thought of God.”

Similarly, Star of Mysore without Abracadabra is unthinkable.

– H.R. Bapu Satyanarayana on e-mail, Saraswathipuram, 8.3.2018

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