The Loku Ayya of all ‘Paththara Mallis’

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Just the other day, while having a cup of plain tea outside Nihal Aiya’s ‘kade’ down 27th Lane with my good friend Daminda Wijewardana, a bearded man just walking by recognized and approached me. He said he had been looking for my number. My friend interjected, ‘Paththara Malli neda (‘Aren’t you the ‘Paper Boy’ — we’ll come to that later?). He laughed, said ‘yes,’ and wanted my number to send me an invitation to an event.

First there was the ‘paththare-wisthare,’ the name of a radio programme that cannot be translated into English with anything close to the punch it carries (‘newspaper accounts’ is patently bland, as is ‘newspaper descriptions’). Someone had to narrate of course and that’s how we got ‘Maththara Malli.’ That was 25 years ago. There are probably many, including those very much younger to Nuwan Jude Liyanage who still call him or refer to him as ‘Paththara Malli,’ and maybe he will never be able to shed that name, even when there’s only a handful of people to whom he would legitimately be a ‘malli.’

Paththara Malli is 25 years old now. Liyanage is close to 50. A quarter of a century and half a century respectively. Should make quite a story.

He was born in 1973, and attended St. Joseph’s (Grandpass) and later St. Benedict’s College, but did his AL’s at Pamunuvila Maha Vidyalaya because he wanted to study Arts. The reason tells us a lot about him. A school trip to Kandy saw him visiting Peradeniya University for the first time. The lush landscape, students strolling around, lovers in various corners and the entire ‘campus’ atmosphere outside of these things fascinated him. His father wanted to move him to Baddegama, his hometown but his mother had objected.

Nuwan didn’t get into Peradeniya. He was selected to Kelaniya University but never completed his degree. He decided to join Veritas as their Colombo Correspondence. Not too long afterwards, Mohan Raj Madawala and some other friends had told him that SLBC was starting a new channel, Lakhanda. The opportunity to create something from scratch was compelling.

‘There were two challenges: old technology and old minds. We were innovative enough to handle the first, but we just couldn’t overcome the second.’

So, when Chirantha Ranwala spoke about ABC Hiru, Nuwan as well as 75 percent of the young people at Lakhanda, left. He was hired as a Research Officer. He speaks proudly about the jingles he made and the creation of the Hiru tag, ‘open Thora lovak natha.’

A few days before the station was launched Thamali Peiris had suggested that they read newspapers. This made him remember the ‘kavi kola karaya,’ a character who frequented crowded places such as bus stands, reciting the choicest verses and enticing the audience to purchase the ‘kavi kolaya’ or ‘sheaf of poems.’

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how ‘Paththara Malli’ (or, ‘Paper Boy’) came into being. A few years later, he moved to Neth FM, but ‘Paththara Malli’ still enjoys the No. 1 position in ratings for the particular time slot. In fact it is the most expensive radio slot in Sri Lanka even now. This, despite the fact that the idea was replicated by all existing radio stations, radio stations set up later and even television stations, following Bandula Padmakura convincing Swarnavahini to do a television version of the programme, ‘Mul Pituwa (Page One).’ As he observed, the cycle-bell that is heard on his programme is probably the one heard most in the country; it is his bell, from the Raleigh bicycle his father used and which he later rode to school. This no one can replicate.

I asked Nuwan if the programme irked those in newspapers. He said, on the contrary, they loved it.

“I had my ethical standards; I never went into the stories themselves. That, I felt and still feel, is the property of the newspaper and contains the intellectual effort of the particular journalist. I can’t steal and earn money off it. I just read the headlines and made a comment or two, sometimes adding a touch of irony or humour. Whenever new newspapers were launched, the editors and owners would approach me and request that I read their headlines as well. I had good relations with news editors. There were times when I suggested an innovative headline and sometimes I would give an idea or two to a cartoonist.’

Nuwan Jude Liyanage didn’t have it easy. At the beginning politicians who felt threatened by him threatened him in turn. They threatened the stations. ‘Later,’ he says, ‘they probably figured out I cannot be stopped.’

Some claim that newspapers will die a natural death soon. Some doubt this assertion. If they die, then we won’t have a ‘Paththara Malli’ or any cheap or equal imitation. Nuwan Jude Liyanage, either way, has left a mark. As someone had said during one of the earlier celebrations of landmarks, his programme is probably unique in that it changed the behaviour patterns of a significant segment of the population.

A ‘loku aiya (older brother)’ in that sense, that is what he is.

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