The Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Or.) 1862-1899, 1879-08-29
journalism In India.


affairs. They are purely product of the
import of Western civilization upon the
Eastern mind, the first one ever issued in
the country bearing the date of 1918.
Their circulation, as rule, is very small,
sometimes merely nominal, although oc-
casionally, when the price is very low
| cent copy or less-the number pnb-
lished may run up towards a thousand.
Of the 36 vernacular newspapers pub
lished in the northwest provinces in 1872,
the average circulation was only 162, and
even of these the government took a
large proportion, chiefly for the use of its
school teachers and to encourage the fee
| BILE efforts of Indian journalism in its in
fancy. The AUahabad Institute Gazette had
the largest number of subscribers (no less
than 38l, but of these only 191 were ma
tive; 100 copies were taken by the gov
ernment, 3S by Europeans and 90 were
exchanged. One paper. the Baddh Prak-
ash, issued los copies, of which 100 went
| to the government and to natives; the
Jagal ,Sdmachar issued 81, of which 80
were taken by the government, 5 were
exchanged, was taken by an European
| and by native. This is truly the day
of small things. But these that we have
mentioned are rather extreme cases.
Three of the native journals in these same
northwest provinces had each from 200
to 250 native subscribers; and in Bengal
and Bombay, where public opinion is
more advanced and education more diff
fused, the figures are much better. The
AnaritG Bazar Patrika, published weekly at
Calcutta very fierce and spirited little
| sheet, bitterly antagonistic to the English
rule, never weary of pointing out its de
| fects, and hence correspondingly dear to
| the native heart is said to have the
largest circulation among the native
| press, its subscribers numbering upwards
of 14O0. Not all the native papers have
| this tone of dissatisfaction with their
| rulers, but it is strongly characteristic of
| them. The character of the English
papers in this country is less peculiar.
| The chief traits about them which strike
| one fresh from contact with the vigor and
power of American journalism are their
| mediocrity, lack of enterprise, and general
dullness. 1t is easy to explain why they
are, as a rule, thus fiat and uninteresting.
Their scope is very limited in every way.
There is a great dearth of live topics
Though India has nearly three hundred
million of inhabitants, it is only very
small fraction of these that can be taken
| into account by the journalist, either as
! furnishing him with themes to write
| about, or people to read what he has
written. The earthly history of nearly
| all these millions can be summed up in
| brief sentence: they are born, they work
| hard to keep soul and body together for a
brief period, and then they die. Then
again, matters which in a free country
are settled by the public, and hence need
to be publicly discussed, are here settled
quietly by handful of officials without
| any public discussion at ali. The Indian
| government is bureaucratic despotism,
tempered by the influence of public opin-
ion in England, but caring next to moth
| ing for public opinion in India. This is
discouraging to journalist of frst-class
ability who wishes to accomplish some
| thing IN his generation, and tends to
make the number of such who come to or
remain in India very small. Further
more, the English-reading public of India
is by no means large; hence really
| good journal. to pay at all with SO limited
subscription list, has to be high priced
To illustrate this, it may be mentioned
that the Pioneer, the leading daily paper
of India, published at Allahabad, and
sending out about 5000 copies day,
charges $24 year in advance, and $33 in
| arrears. The Friend of India, a secular
| weekly, published at Calcutta, charges $11
year, and one of the religious weeklies
in the same city costs So per annum. No
other paper in the country has anything
| like the circulation of the Pioneer. There
| or four of the chief dailies in the presi-
| dency towns have between 1900 and 1000
subscribers, but the rest have to be salts
| fed with considerably less than thou
sand, and some have small pickings IN
deed. As rule, the support is very pre-
carious, and the papers short-lived. They
spring suddenly into existence, and strug
gle for while prosperously or otherwise.
according to the ability or the money of
the one man on whose shoulders they
usually rest. When he gets tired of his
| burden or his whim, or for any cause de-
parts, the papers disappear as quickly as
they rose.