BHUBANESWAR: The new Odia daily “The Prameya” hit the stands here on Thursday with noted economist Prof. Prabhat Patnaik calling for emergence of more non-corporate newspapers. “Worldwide, the media today is corporate-controlled and is used to promote the interests of the owners. The need is to promote more non-corporate newspapers,” he said.
At the launch of the newspaper, Prof Patnaik cited the examples of media barons like Rupert Murdoch and Silvio Berlusconi and said the media houses owned by them had one agenda: to promote the interests of their owners.”
Ramakant Rath, noted poet and former chief secretary of the State, released the first copy of the newspaper.
On the occasion, Resident Editor, The New Indian Express, Orissa, Srimoy Kar said when newspapers are struggling to survive world over, birth of a new newspaper is welcome. It is difficult for the owner of a newspaper to remain neutral today as he is dependent on advertisements to run the daily.
Senior journalist Rajaram Satpathy said few know that Sadhu Sundar Das, a sanyasi living in Kujibar village in Odisha’s Cuttack district, had first brought out the “Kujibar Patra” on palm leaf in 1769 which probably was the country’s first newspaper.
Editor of the newspaper Ganeswar Mishra and Manojranjan Nayak, Managing Director of the Summa Real Media Pvt. Ltd, the company which launched The Prameya, spoke.