GUWAHATI: How old is too old to do a job that demands more than the 9-5 drill? At 90, Lalbiakthanga Pachuau is not old enough.
Aizawl-based Pachuau, the editor of vernacular daily Zoram Tlangau, goes to office regularly and plans his readers’ menu for the next day to prove that age is just a number. Or, as he says, “a state of mind”.
On Friday, the Mizoram government handed over a citation to Pachuau for his “evergreen” approach to life, hailing him as the oldest working journalist in India. Information and public relations minister Lal Thanzara said it was an honour to honour a man who never tires of working even past the normal retiring age.
“Pachuau wrote his first news article on May 16, 1953 in Zoram Thupuan, a local newspaper, and has been publishing and editing his own daily since 1970,” Zo Hmingmawia, secretary of the Mizoram Journalists Association (MJA), said on Saturday.
A war veteran-turned-journalist, Pachuau was the president of MJA for three terms. He was decorated with war medals such as Burma Star, J&K General Service Medal and Sainya Seva Medal. He played a major role in the Mizo peace talks of the 1980s, and co-founded the Association for Voluntary Blood Donation in Mizoram.