Chandigarh: Sir Mark Tully belonged to a disappearing breed of journalists – reporters who immersed themselves in the rhythm of a country, who did not observe it from a distance but walked its streets, sat in its homes, and listened to people with patience and attention.His obituaries have catalogued his numerous achievements: his long BBC career, his understanding of India, his calm voice in turbulent times, and his influence on generations of journalists.Yet his professional milestones, however, distinguished, capture only part of the man. What deserves equal – perhaps greater – emphasis is his humanity: his instinctive decency, curiosity, and respect with which he approached people, places, and events, and which ultimately defined both his brilliant journalism and his relationships.For generations of Indians, especially before the explosion of electronic, social and private media, he was much more than the BBC’s voice. He was Tully Saheb, or Tuli Saheb, as he was affectionately known in Punjab, a region which he covered extensively for years – whose reportage was as steady for nearly four decades, as it was reassuring and whose calm, measured delivery conveyed authority without a hint of theatrics.I knew Tuli Saheb reasonably well. having on occasion travelled with him across Punjab during the darkest years of militancy in the 1980s and 1990s. Fear then was palpable across the state – stalking towns, cities, villages and highways alike, yet wherever Tully went – and he did go everywhere and frequently – he was met with genuine warmth.Crowds of Sikhs offered apne Tuli Saheb unstinting hospitality, for at the time the BBC – and Tully – were the only credible voice of factual reporting in the wilderness of chaos and state duplicity that engulfed the militancy-torn region. He interacted easily with everyone, his crooked smile and inner warmth disarming, slipping effortlessly into a delightful polyglot of Hindi and Punjabi to convey news and draw out reactions to the disturbing goings-on. For Punjabis in the years of terrorism, Operation Blue Star and the 1984 Sikh pogrom, Tuli Saheb became the human face of trustworthy journalism – an authority built on consistency and integrity, not flamboyance or subjectivity.Away from the field, Tully’s humanity shone in different ways.Also read: From Emergency to Babri Demolition: Remembering Mark Tully, a Fearless Titan of JournalismHis home and office at 1 Nizamuddin East in New Delhi were informal havens, where rum and Jameson whisky, in the pre-liberalisation era, flowed freely, his Java Dawson cigars from Trichinopoly – bought by the box – perfumed the air, and his two Golden Retrievers moved through the room without ceremony, unmindful of the celebrity status of their affectionate master.Such evenings with Tully Saheb were full of laughter, irreverence, conversation, and curiosity—far removed from the serious tones of broadcast news, yet deeply engaging. Conversation drifted effortlessly—from politics and history to gossip and the small absurdities of daily life in India—punctuated by dry humour and gentle ridicule. He listened as intently as he spoke, probing, questioning, without trace of his solemn broadcast persona.Tully Saheb was a warm and companionable raconteur, yet even in these relaxed moments, his journalist’s instinct never dimmed, remaining quietly attuned to the world beyond the room. Even in later years, Tully’s sharp wit and memory remained undimmed. I last met him at the Indian International Centre bar in New Delhi some years ago, just before he was laid low by age and infirmity. Over drinks, he recounted stories ranging from the absurdities of Indian bureaucracy to incisive observations on contemporary politics and the decline in Indian journalists’ standards, all delivered with his signature understated charm and occasional mischievous Hindi profanity.However, underneath all that Tully Saheb was unmistakably English, a child of the late colonial era, shaped by attending Marlborough College in Wiltshire and Trinity College Cambridge thereafter, where he studied history and theology, in preparation for joining the clergy. After Cambridge he enrolled at Lincoln Theological College with the intention of becoming a priest, but left after just two terms, realising that the ecumenical discipline and existence were just not for him.And, like many Englishmen of his generation, he viewed the United States with a degree of instinctive suspicion, rooted less in ideology than in temperament. American exuberance unsettled him as did its citizens’ brazen informality and buoyant self-confidence, which he considered somewhat brash, bordering on vulgar.Also read: Legendary British-Indian Journalist and Broadcaster Mark Tully Passes AwayHis first encounter with America came relatively late in life, when he was already in his fifties. On his return to London, a BBC colleague and I met him in a pub near Bush House and asked what he had made of the country and its people. He paused, took a measured sip of his beer, and replied with impeccable understatement, “You know, I quite liked it.”The remark stayed with me, recalling as it did Sir George Mallory’s famously spare explanation in the 1920s for climbing Everest – “Because it’s there.” It revealed something intrinsic about Tully: an openness of mind and an instinctive willingness to allow lived experience, rather than inherited assumptions, to shape his judgments. This was akin to how he came to view the land of his adoption, a place that, for him, existed interminably without full stops and one suffused with the concept of fate and karma, rather than the widely perceived Anglican outlook, adopted by Tully Saheb’s colonising ancestors.Those of us fortunate enough to have travelled with him, shared a drink, or simply listened to his broadcasts carry more than memories. Above all, we carry a gold standard of journalism – defined by Tully’s integrity, restraint, and humanity as a reporter. In an age increasingly dominated by noise, spectacle, and the hyperbolic worship of India’s political leadership, Tully Saheb’s unassuming and objective example endures: a reminder of what it means to understand situations clearly, report them truthfully, and, above all, without arrogance, distortion, or deference to power and respect the world one seeks to explain.