I cannot think of any other editor who would have been as cooperative and his sensitivity was Rauf Ahmed’s biggest strength. He understood his team and showcased their strength. I was petrified of attending film parties and he protected me. Similarly, he understood that I had a crush on Shashi Kapoor and indulged me to meet the actor whenever I wanted. And yet the life of a film scribe is not only about the movie stars…
Editing, production are a few things all of us have to master. He taught us the skill of working with layout artists and aid in page making. It was watching him draw pagination that we learnt how to balance the content with the advertisements. Rauf trained each one of us in choosing appropriate images for the story. How to write catchy headlines and pick the best quote for highlight.
Those were days of manual artworks, of bromides and Rauf toiled over every word and line, month after month. He was obsessed with clean copies and rewrote, till the pages went to print. In his quest for perfection, he often missed deadlines but he made up for the time loss by personally dropping the lay-out sheets to the processor!