The newspapers have been with us long before the start of the freedom struggle. It’s almost 340 years since the first published newspaper was introduced in India.
The first newspaper was a weekly, started by a British, JA Hicky, in the name of ‘Bengal Gazette’ and published from Calcutta, in 1780. It contained mainly advertisements, and so was also called as Calcutta General Advertiser. On a similar theme, a few more newspapers emerged in Calcutta and Bombay, to cater the needs of news and market.
As the age of newspapers in India was started by the British, mostly these were owned and published by the Englishmen. Few newspapers took the local Indians on board, so that there is more reach and publicity of the news and advertisements in the local regions. Some prominent newspapers which came into existence during this time were ‘Calcutta Chronicle’ and ‘Bombay Herald’.
This was the time when the British government was having strict control over all news, and no news against the kingdom and East India Company could be published, under any circumstances. The same can be thought as the public finding only that news, which was favored and promoted by the British.
Sounds familiar?
In 1811, James Buckingham came up with his work and started the age of real journalism in the country. He was the Editor of Calcutta Chronicle, and raised the issues which were actually related to common people. The freedom of press started gaining momentum and reformers like Raja Ram Mohan Roy and Fardonji Murzban also came up with their newspapers. During the freedom struggle of 1857, as many as 200 newspapers in local languages were being published, which ignited the flame of independence among Indians from all regions. The English newspapers were very less, which could be easily understood and controlled by the British. So the government passed The Vernacular Press Act of 1858, which restricted any local newspaper to write anything against the British Government. This led to huge protests against the British rule and finally they had to repeal the Act.
Earlier there were no businessmen/capitalists funding the newspapers. At least 40 newspapers were already being published on a large scale, during the freedom struggle of India. Most of them were being run by freedom fighters such as Mahatma Gandhi, Annie Besant, Motilal Nehru, Maulana Azad and Bal Gandadhar Tilak, or some social reformers and activists. In those days, only freedom fighters, journalists or social workers wanted to publish newspapers, as it was not a means of generating money. Publishing a newspaper was meant to empower the common people of India, who had no knowledge about the news of freedom movement. The Press Trust of India (PTI) was started in 1946 and linked with major news agencies of the world to exchange news.
After the independence, journalism entered a new age where they enjoyed all kinds of freedom, but started maintaining a professional approach. More and more jobs were being given in this sector, with new technologies and machinery being introduced to print paper. Nowadays, the state of Indian newpapers and media sector has become more of an advertiser, be it of the government or commercials. This shows that we have again reached the stage where we started 300 years ago. During this time we started to evolve but then something stopped us from going forward.
Is it the money involved, or the urge to be in the good books of the government? Every media house today, is now a slave of India’s biggest business tycoons. Why do businessmen keep hold of the news which is meant for the public?
The media must start doing self-analysis in order to find out what should be their actual role in today’s world. Do we need a media which sits in the lap of the government and echoes everything said by the rulers? Or do we need a voice which has the courage to ask questions to the government and support the rule of people? A big time soul-searching is the need of the hour.
