I’d love to say, that as a journalist, I’m so committed to delivering high quality news to readers I’d risk my life to do so, but that would be a big fat lie.
And while I sit here in my perfectly non-life-threatening office, there’s one journalist out there who’s putting us all to shame by getting out there in the trenches and putting his life on the line for the sake of news… and good television, of course.
A journalist in Pakistan risked his life when he reported live in the middle of a huge flood in which water levels reached his neck.
You can (and absolutely should) watch the full clip here:
GTV reporter Azadar Hussain delivered his report on the flooding of the Sind river in the Punjab this week while just his head and one hand holding a microphone were visible above the murky looking water.
Hussain remained calm while he spoke about how the floods were affecting the agriculture of the land in that area.
The journalist’s report has now, quite rightly, gone viral, with people all over the world congratulating him on his commitment to the cause. Meanwhile, others suggested he’d gone ‘insane’ to put himself in such danger purely for the sake of a news report.
One person tweeted Hussain’s ‘commitment level is high’, while another suggested his reporting had ‘some depth’, and I’m just kicking myself because I didn’t come up with these puns first.
Likewise, in 2017, News 18 Tamil Nadu reporter Anand decided to swim across sewage-filled flood water in a village in Kancheepuram, just to get quotes from the people on the other end.
Imagine a world where we all went to such lengths to get our jobs done. Parcels would always be delivered in time, banks wouldn’t take weeks to refund your money and there would probably a lot less plastic pollution in the world.
But for now, all we can do is strive to better ourselves to be more like Hussain in committing ourselves to getting the job done to the best of our ability.
For my next piece of news, you can expect to see me reporting from the top of the Shard in London, shouting my story out with a megaphone. This one’s for you Hussain.
If you have a story you want to tell send it to UNILAD via story@unilad.com
Emma Rosemurgey is an NCTJ trained Journalist who started her career by producing The Royal Rosemurgey newspaper in 2004, which kept her family up to date with the goings on of her sleepy north east village. She graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston and started her career in regional newspapers before joining Tyla (formerly Pretty 52) in 2017, and progressing onto UNILAD in 2019.