HISTORY OF HINDI JOURNALISM

The first Hindi newspaper Oodhund Martand, a weekly was published in Kolkata on May 30, 1826. However, its editor Yugal Kishore Shukla faced many difficulties in running it. He was not allowed postal concession and had to close down the paper within a year. He made an attempt to start another paper in 1850 called Samyadani Martand but this also failed. 

The second Hindi newspaper Bangadoot was published in 1829 by Raja Ram Mohan Roy and Dwarika Prasad Thakore with Nilratan Haldar as its editor. Besides Hindi, it was also published in English, Bengali and Persian.

The first Hindi daily Samachar Sudha Varshan came out in June 1854 from Kolkata with Shyam Sundar Sen as its editor and publisher. It was a bilingual paper in which market and shipping reports were published in Hindi, the rest in Bengali.

Between 1850 and 1857 a number of Hindi Newspapers were published. Among them were Benaras Akbar, Sudhakar Tatwa Bodhini, Patrika and Sathya. Benaras Akhbar (1849) was the first paper to introduce Devnagari script in the North-West provinces. Some papers of this time used to carry both a Hindi and Urdu name and used to publish news in both languages in parallel columns, for example Sarvopkarak (Mufid-ul-Khaliaq), published from Agra in 1861 and the Bharat Khandamitra (Ab-i-hayat-i-Hind), published in 1864. But this trend did not last long. 

A literary magazine which set the standard for Hindi Journals in the early years was  Saraswathi, a monthly edited by Mahavir Prasad Dwibedy. It standardised the style and pattern of Hindi journalism and developed literary criticism and book reviews. It became the torchbearer for later day Hindi journalists who cultivated its prose style.

Newspapers like Bharat Mitra (1878), Sarsudhanidhi (1879), Uchit Wakta (1880) and Hindi Bangavasi (1890) were published from Calcutta during the last three decades of 19^th  century. Bharat Mitra, published from Calcutta became the leading Hindi newspaper of the time under the dynamic stewardship of its early editors, Balmukund Gupta and Ambika Prasad Bajpai.

Approximately 150 papers and journals were either started or restarted between 1884 and 1894. The contents of most of these papers were concerned with social or religious subjects, many of them were sectional, some were political and a few set a high literary standard.

The beginning of the new century saw the birth of many Hindi dailies in Bombay, Calcutta and Patna. The more prominent among them were Sri Venkateswar Samachar  and  Calcutta  Samachar. Viswamitra, which was started after the Calcutta Samachar became defunct, offered serious competition to Bharat Mitra from 1918.

Hindi journalism made rapid progress during the First World War period and many outstanding journalists came to the fore including Ganga Prasad Gupta, Nanda Kumar Deo Dharma, M. P.  Dwivedi, Hari Krishna Jouhar, Chhote Ram Shukla, Indra Vidyavachaspati, Shri Ram Pandey, Lakshminarayan Garde and Narmada Prasad Misra. One of the foremost Hindi journalists who earned a name for his patriotism was Ganesh Shanker Vidyarthi. In 1913, he brought out weekly Pratap from Kanpur. He made the supreme sacrifice in 1931 in the cause of Hindu-Muslim unity. Krishna Dutt Paliwal brought out Sainik from Agra which became a staunch propagator of nationalism in Western U. P. The noted Congress leader, Swami Shradhanand, started the publication of Hindi journal Vir Arjun and Urdu journal Tej. After the assassination of Swami Shradhanand, Vidyavachaspathi and Lala Deshbandhu Gupta, both prominent Congress leaders continued the publication of these journals.

At the turn of the century almost all Calcutta based Hindi newspapers went vocal against the suppressive and divisive policies of the Raj. This marked the beginning – in 1907- of two outstanding magazines: Nrisinha and Devnagar. Nrisinha edited by Ambika Prasad Vajpayee, a stauch supporter of Lokmanya Tilak was a political magazine and it joined the protest against British rule. Devnagar on the other hand tried to work on a uniform script.

In 1920, the Aj was started in Banaras. It played a notable part in the freedom struggle. Its first editor was Sri Prakasa, a great freedom fighter who occupied positions of power and prestige in free India. He was assisted by Babu Rao Vishnu Parakar whose contribution to the development of Hindi Journalism was considerable. Espousing the national cause and waging a never-ending battle with the alien rulers, the Aj was a bulwark of the Indian National Congress and its main forum to spread the message of freedom to the Hindi-speaking masses of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Nepal. It set the tone and style for Hindi Journalism and was acclaimed for its impartial objective reporting and illuminating and fearless editorials. A balanced blending of national and international news was one of its strong features.

In Patna the Desh, a weekly, was an influential journal and the mouthpiece of the Congress. It was founded by Babu Rajendra Prasad and his friends in 1920. But it was not a profitable venture and had to close down.

In 1924 there were 102 Hindi newspapers; four of them were dailies (AJ, Banaras,  Swatantra, Calcutta, Arjun, Delhi and Calcutta Samachar, Calcutta) According to a historian, until 1926, Hindi dailies were not financially successful.  “Their get up and printing was poor, the reading material not quite up to the mark and the editorials unwieldy and lengthy. The weeklies were better edited and got up.” Among the well-known better produced weeklies were Bhavishya (Kanpur), Karmaveer (Khandwa) and Sainik (Agra).

Among the important Hindi dailies which flourished in 1930 were:   Viswamitra and Bharat Mitra (Calcutta), Savadho  Bharat  (Bombay), Lokkat (Jabalpur), Variman (Kanpur),   Milap (Lahore)  besides AJ (Banaras), Arjun (Delhi) and Lokmanya (Calcutta).

As the freedom struggle gained momentum, there was a steady rise of Hindi journalism both in terms of quality and quantity. More Hindi publications started in almost all North Indian states and also in Maharashtra, Bengal, and Andhra Pradesh, especially Hyderabad. Hindi publications like other language publications by and large supported the Nationalist movement and faced the suppression of the British rulers. One of the important Hindi dailies to be published from the capital was Hindustan, sister newspaper of the Hindustan Times, started in 1936.  Wide news coverage and a variety of special features marked the  Hindustan. Started in 1940, Aryavari of Patna was a sister publication of the Indian Nation and enjoyed considerable influence.

Hindi journalism grew more rapidly after independence. After independence Hindi was adopted as the official language of India. This also helped to spread Hindi language nationwide. The NavBharat Times of the Times of India group started in Delhi in 1950. The Amrita Patrika of Allahabad was another notable Hindi daily which was well-known for its editorials. By 1964 Hindi had the largest number of newspapers among language papers. The trend of publishing multiple editions from different states helped Hindi newspapers to increase their reach and circulation.

According to RNI (Registrar of Newspapers in India) the total number of publications in Hindi was 27,527 in 2007-8 including 3418 daily newspapers and 12793 weeklies.

By mid 2011 Hindi daily Dainik Jagran claimed to be the largest read newspaper of the world. Six out of the top ten newspapers with highest number of readership in India were Hindi. According to IRS (Indian Readership Survey the top ten largest read Hindi newspapers are: Dainik Jagran (readership: 164.1 lakh), Dainik Bhaskar (146 lakh), Hindustan (120.4 lakh), Amar Ujala  (88.4 lakh), Rajasthan Patrika (68.47 lakh), Punjab Kesari (33.30 lakh),  Navbharat Times (25.73 lakh) Prabhat Khabar (21.87 lakh), Patrika (17.87 lakh) and Nai Dunia (16.49  lakh). All of the newspapers have multiple editions from different cities and states.

Hindi newspapers are published from several states. Besides the North Indian Hindi belt, sizable numbers of Hindi publications are there in West Bengal, Maharashtra, Gujarat and other states. There are two popular Hindi dailies from Hyderabad – Swatantra Vaartha  and Milap. Kolkata based Sanmarg has an edition from Bhubaneswar, Odisha too. Assam also had Hindi newspapers. Dainik Lokamanya was the first Hindi newspaper of Assam. It was published in 1963 in Guwahati by Pandit Ramshankar Tripathi. The four page broadsheet was priced 10 paisa. It survived only for few months.

Few interesting facts:

-       The Indian language newspapers covered the mental gap between readers in rural areas and the English language press

-       Local language newspapers reflected the views of their readers more accurately and in clearer terms than English newspapers

-       Hindi newspapers played a constructive role in the promotion of government policies

-       Hindi newspapers helped the understanding of political process and as a result more and more people were attracted to active politics

-       Hindi newspapers played an important role during elections for propaganda and views on local affairs

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