It is not only because of the passion for journalism, but also the differences on the idea of what actually should be a journalist between proprietors running big newspapers and journalist working under them that serves as the reason for some journalists to start evening dailies which have only one leaf and requiring minimal investment.
Those running printing houses with 15×10 inches size printing machine will take no time in reprinting or reproducing the kind of this small newspaper once they got a copy of it. Printing technology these days has developed and evolved tremendously. Everyone knows. Those running small newspapers (particularly the evening dailies produced here in Imphal) do have aspirations of producing multipage colour newspapers, but due to certain limitations and constraints, evening newspapers still continue the traditional style of one leaf print – (2 page paper). The critical point that needs to be highlighted here is not about why the evening newspapers are very very small. As we at the Imphal Times felt that almost all educated people particularly professors in the Colleges and Manipur University will certainly understand the reason.
In an issue about misappropriation of fund by certain authorities of the Imphal Municipal Corporation where opposing corporators alleged irregularities and misappropriation of funds over the auctioning of 8 vehicles, Almost all evening newspapers based in Imphal were raped by news reviewer/ critics .
Every learned people particularly those in the DIPR knows how an official advertisement will be done in newspaper as per rules of the Manipur Advertisement Policy.
When the Opposing Corporators of the IMC alleged that no proper guidelines were followed to the auctioning of 8 vehicles they have definitely point out the way that the Chairman of the IMC and his sub-ordinates had manipulated the procedural documents. They also showed two manipulated evening newspapers in which the advertisment was published.
As per record, any govt. advertisement should be done through DIPR. The opposition Corporators showed that there was no official intimation sent to the DIPR regarding publication of the advertisement. The Opposition Corporators also showed a forged document which tried to show that DIPR had received a notification regarding the same issue. There was no such record for received of the document at DIPR files. There is also another proof to show that the two newspapers produced by the ruling corporators for auctioning of the 8 vehicles could also have been a fake and forged one.
The matter was reported by Imphal Times as we believed that state government will initiate the needful until Prof. MC Arun brought up the issue during news analysis at All India Radio Imphal yesterday morning. As per our local adjustment we the journalists maintained respect for all newspapers and as a matter of fact we don’t mention the names of any newspaper until and unless they are proven guilty of doing something wrong. Just by stating that two newspapers with two publications on a same day without properly describing on how and why it happened had indeed raped all the evening newspapers of Manipur. Had he elaborated on how those things goes after analysing the news report published at each newspaper, than, Imphal Times would not have picked up this issue.
By the way Imphal Times was not the newspaper that the opposition produced in front of reporters that day, but the professor whom we hold in high regard had raped all evening newspapers. We don’t need any clarification from the learned Professor, but hope that he understands what the small newspapers are doing for the erstwhile kingdom which may be much more than the big newspapers or electronic media.
