Donald J Trump is officially United States President Donald Trump. Newsrooms across the world are having a hard time processing this development. Here in India, we’re dealing with the shock by punning extravagantly in our headlines.

The Times of India

Within hours of the election results being announced, India’s leading English newspaper thought it fit to put out a story with this headline.

This right here is a good illustration of why we need more women in the newsroom.

Luckily, ToI decided to alter the headline for its front page today.

As puns go, “don” is not a bad one. Well done ToI.

The paper went with a three-line kicker, calling Trump the “ultimate outsider” who tapped into the anger of a largely male, white working-class. The report ended quoting film-maker Michael Moore cautioning everyone that “blue collar workers in the industrial belt were poised to deliver the ‘biggest f*** you’ in human history by electing Trump”.  Inside, the paper has dedicated three pages, titled “America Decides” to the election results. The edit piece looks at the impact on India with Trump’s presidency. ToI is largely hopeful but states India must come up with “Trump Plan” if he follows through on this protectionist agenda.

Indian Express

The three-word headline says much and is perhaps the only thing that is certain about the Trump presidency: that the US and the rest of the world will indeed have to deal with him.

Reports on the front page capture the shock Trump’s presidency has delivered to many Americans. “What do I tell my children?” asked one headline, quoting political commentator and author Van Jones on CNN. The edit page went with the headline “11/9” drawing perhaps from commentary on social media that compared 9/11 to 11/9. The edit is less hopeful than ToI and states the coming years could be the most tumultuous since the ’60s.

Hindustan Times

HT flipped the “Yes We Can” that was Barack Obama’s election slogan to “Yes They Did” on its front page.

The first line of the report states: “It’s President Donald Trump now. Get used to it.” We’d specify it’s United States’s President Donald Trump, but we get the sentiment. Inside, a two-page spread is dedicated to the American elections with the headline: “If Trump is bad for the US, he’s not good for us”. The lead copy is by HT Editor-in-Chief Bobby Ghosh, who makes it clear why there is no reason to be hopeful about Trump and that there is no comfort to be gleaned from Trump saying he loves “the Hindus”. Ghosh wrote:

“But perhaps most important, Trump is bad for India because he is bad for his own country, and the wellbeing of the US is now closely connected to our own.

There is every indication that his leadership will harm American interests, at home and abroad.”

The Hindu

The paper went with the standard “shock and awe” headline, with a lead copy focusing on Trump’s victory speech. The opinion page has an edit piece titled “Understanding Trumpocalypse”. It questions why “the US media and pollsters fail to see which way the wind was blowing?” and stresses on the backlash of the “silent majority” against the American elite. We’re also, well, shocked, by the literary flair of this sentence: “At the heart of the shock result is the shock itself…”.

The Telegraph

The Kolkata-headquartered daily, predictably, went with a one-word pun as its headline.

Considering Trump’s much-publicised racist comments, it’s ironic that the newspaper chose to focus on his raised fist, which has been a symbol of solidarity and made headlines during the 1968 Olympics as a ‘black power salute’.

Written by KP Nayar, the lead copy looks closely at Trump’s victory speech and also points out that China is likely to be higher up in Trump’s priorities. However, Trump does have a soft spot for India.

“Temperamentally, he is well disposed towards India. He has even shown a willingness to be economical with the truth in putting the best face on his preference for India.

During his third presidential debate with Hillary Clinton last month, Trump suo motu said in reply to a question about growth that “I just left some high representatives of India. They are growing at eight per cent. China is growing at seven per cent…. We are growing, our last report came out and it is right around the one per cent level and I think it is going down.”

I made extensive enquiries about the “high representatives of India” that Trump claimed to have met just before the debate. The Trump campaign could throw no light on any such meeting.” 

For Hindi dailies, the Rs 500-Rs1000 story jostled for space with the Trump’s presidency.

Dainik Jagran went with the familiar refrain for its headline: “Ab Ki Baar Trump Sarkar”.

The paper is hopeful about Trump’s impact on India, stating that he had praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi on numerous occasions.

Navbharat Times

The Hindi daily went with cowboy Trump for its lead graphic, which is by far our favourite. The headline says: “America Ne Chalaya Trump Card”, but the real genius is in the Photoshop. Not only is there the joy of seeing Cowboy Trump, the cartoon Narendra Modi in the corner is whining about how more people care about the American election than his crackdown on black money.

As for pros and cons for India, NBT believes it will be difficult for Indians to get jobs in the US, but the tough stance on terror will help India.

Dainik Bhaskar

11/9 made it to the headline of Dainik Bhaskar too. It’s one of the few that pointed out the allegations of sexual harassment against Trump and Trump has faced the widespread opposition in media and business circles.

Every news publication assumes an audience and decides what it will prioritise on that basis – we tend to forget this because usually, the same news items demand headlines on the front page. Trump’s presidential win came in on a day that India was grappling with a massive domestic issue – the recall of the old Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes. That Trump still made headlines in both Hindi and English newspapers is a timely reminder of how much of an influence that country, two oceans away, wields over us. China being interested in the American elections makes good sense, considering how closely the two countries are entangled economically. However, India is far from a priority for America and as more than one newspaper has pointed out, Trump is not likely to keep Hindus, sorry, Indians in his thoughts as he takes over from Barack Obama.

In a way, the extensive coverage has served to send into the inner pages something that is actually and directly affecting the nation right now. If you want reports and analysis of how well-planned the process of demonetization has been, if it’s practical in India where so few have official identification papers and how the banking sector is responding to the demands being made of it, you’ll have to look inside the newspaper. Why? Because we’ve been Trumped.