Urdu readership in India is on a decline. While India globalizes and marches ahead to amalgamate into the world, we continue to unrobe the languages that were our identities. But when it comes to Urdu, we luckily still have some news organisations that are keeping the culture of reading Urdu alive.
The Siasat Delhi:
On the 15th of August 1949, Abid Ali Khan and Mehboob Hussain Jigar, brought life to today’s ‘The Siasat Urdu’ Daily. Only two years from independence, and about a year after Hyderabad became part of India, this Urdu newspaper was introduced. Siasat would then be a bridge between the Muslims of the Deccan who choose to live in India instead of migrating to Pakistan. Khan and Jigar have since then played their part in media projects and the philanthropy and promotion of Urdu. Siasat also launched an e-paper and became the first Urdu outlet to do so. Its online English edition was launched in 2011 to promote Khan and Jigar through the growing reach of independent news websites. Its Hindi version began in 2017.
Roznama Rashtriya Sahara:
Roznama Rashtriya Sahara is another Urdu Daily of our country that is published by Sahara India Pariwar. Each edition is printed at nine centers in seven different states, including Delhi, Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Mumbai, Kolkata, Patna, Bengaluru, and Kanpur. The newspaper is credited for honest reporting and credible diverse coverage.
Hamara Hind:
This is an online news website that targets Urdu speaking population existing primarily on the internet. The focus of the news is slightly more global and contains abundant news on what’s happening in other Muslim or Urdu speaking countries. It was a vision of late journalist Dr Govind Narain Srivastava that was materialized by his son Ankit Srivastava in 2020. While the news website team is based in Delhi, with reporters present in various cities of India along with metro cities of Pakistan and Dhaka, Bangladesh. The online portal receives traffic majorly from India and Pakistan in the tune of more than 5 million views per month. The newspaper organisation also runs a youtube channel that features news and exclusive interviews with personalities across the globe on topics including geo-politics, current affairs and policies. Hamara Hind has an E-paper and there was an announcement of launching the print edition too.
Etemaad Daily:
This is an Urdu daily situated in Hyderabad’s Darussalam region, Telangana, that publishes online news in English and Urdu. Etemaad Daily was again founded in 2002 and is owned by the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, a regional political party. Burhanuddin Owaisi is the editor and his father, Sultan Salahuddin Owaisi, was the president of this local political party. The newspaper is known to introduce more colored pages for the first time in Urdu Newspaper circuit. The edition of Etemaad Daily has 8 pages.
