After her marriage, the journalist in her got the opportunity to develop as her husband was very encouraging. “My husband was very supporting. He had even asked me to join BT Training,” Mrs. Nirash recounts.

The Nirashs had also brought out an English monthly magazine ‘Broader news and view’ in 1973. It was the first English magazine from Sikkim. However, this endeavour could not sustain itself and so she started “Jamana Sadabahar”, a Hindi weekly in 1987 from Gangtok which is, till this day, being published. She writes, edits and collects news by herself for this paper even today.

Regarding the standard of journalism of Sikkim, she says that day by day the number of young journalists is increasing. People are taking up journalism as a profession. ”If the trend goes on, the prospect of journalism in Sikkim will be brighter as there will be competition and competition brings about quality.”

She, however, adds that corruption has entered into journalism, too. Claiming that she herself writes for the betterment of the society, Maaji says “Only the journalists who steer clear of this practice can write honestly, truly and give right directions to the society.”

In her more than three decade long career in journalism, Maaji, who has gone through the days of LD Kazi, the first chief minister of Sikkim to the present chief minister Pawan Chamling, has however, never tried to suck up to any leaders. In spite of her closeness with these all chief ministers, she still resides in a rented home.

“Once I was offered a government flat, but I rejected the offer, my profession is enough to make ends meet. This kind of business will always make me grateful to them (leaders),” she says.

Maaji is not only determined and resolved but also advocates woman empowerment. One of her fortes is to write for women emancipation. This line proves it: one day, there was a power outage in the press and her paper wasn’t in a position to be published, she right away started penning news. Throughout the night she wrote news by herself and the next morning the paper hit the book stands. She further says (about the general election in which Dil Kumari Bhandari was contesting.) “She was a woman candidate; I wanted to see her victory not because she was N B Bhandari’s wife but because it would become a stepping stone towards woman empowerment in the country and it happened so.”