On the joyous occasion of Vartha Bharati stepping into its 19th year...
SPECIAL EDITORIAL
Today, your Vartha Bharati is entering the 19th year of its journey, of which, every step was unforgettable. Our heartfelt congratulations to every member of our 200-strong team who made this feat possible, by facing the most adverse and testing situations, sometimes nervously and most often with great courage. Similarly, our heartfelt thanks to all the supporters of Vartha Bharati who have constantly encouraged us and stood with us throughout our adventurous journey. In addition, our most humble salutations to our critics who meticulously scrutinise each move of ours, and by repeatedly haunting, taunting, abusing, accusing, defaming, intimidating, reviling and humiliating us, provided us fresh impetus everyday and helped us keep our spirit always high.
We started a campaign this August. We decided to seek the help of our readers and well wishers spread across the state, country and overseas to put an end to our financial woes. It was our innocent estimation that if we could get 10,000 subscribers to pay Rs 5,000 each as annual subscription for our online edition, it would help us breathe easy at least for some time. We announced this and published repeated reminders. As a result we were able to get 68 subscribers during the past 28 days. We are grateful to each of these 68 paid subscribers. At this rate, it would take only 12 long years for us to reach our target of getting 10,000 paid subscribers.
For us at Vartha Bharati , this is the moment to do some serious introspection on issues related to our existence. At the same time, this might be the right occasion for all our readers, well wishers and supporters to loudly discuss the situation with each other over next few days. We insist on this discussion to be aloud because otherwise, there is a possibility of each one of them assuming that his or her contribution would not matter, as all others might have already made their payment !
As we celebrate our ability to have somehow survived all these years, we hope our readers would bear with us sharing some of our hopes and disillusions.
We have not yet given up our dream of running this newspaper fully based on subscriptions and totally free from advertisements. That in fact would require a few thousand committed readers regularly buying the newspaper, paying Rs 20 per copy everyday. Although we have been presenting this ideal before the huge community of our esteemed readers, the response so far has not been very encouraging. When we launched our online editions some time ago, we had our share of apprehensions. It was a pleasant surprise, however, to see our online edition, YouTube News channel, Facebook page, Instagram page and English news bulletin earn so much of popularity within a short span of time. Today, various online Avatars of Vartha Bharati are ahead of most of the well known online news sources in Kannada.
Compared to the size of the readership of our print edition, the number of readers, viewers and listeners of our online productions has increased manifold. The new community has developed an emotional bonding with this Media house. If even a chunk of them develop the revolutionary culture of paying a small annual subscription, it would ease our task to a great extent. As most of our readers have not yet come forward to become paid subscribers, we are left with no choice but to depend on the advertisement revenue. Yet, we firmly stand by our resolve to accept only unconditional advertisements. This indeed has pitched us against a bunch of tough challenges. Many industrialists, leaders, officers, priests and political parties have tried in vain to use Vartha Bharati as their embouchure and even turned vengeful on failing time and again to do so. However, we never used their ire and the consequent obstructions as an excuse to compromise any of our core principles or commitments
It is time, for the mature and sensitive consumers who understand the crucial role of independent, objective and fearless Media to appreciate the critical nature of the situation. They should come forward to actively support not only Vartha Bharati but all those similarly committed and honest Media houses in all the languages that are being regularly targeted and challenged by the establishment, the corrupt bureaucracy, wicked politicians and communal outfits. Mere lip service will serve no purpose at all. The consumers must come forward to share the burden of the media houses that they admire. Otherwise, through their inaction, the well-meaning would passively be collaborating with the evil forces, hell bent upon crushing the Media houses that have always stoutly refused to deviate from the right path.
A.S.Puthige
Editor in Chief
On Behalf of Team VB
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Traffic congestion on Ullal bridge as NHAI begins repair work after video of pothole goes viral
Mangaluru: Commuters on the National Highway 66 here are struggling with the traffic problems due to the repair work that are going on since Thursday on the old bridge across River Nethravathi near Ullal.
The National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has permitted light motor vehicle drivers to use the new bridge on the eastern end, which is a one-way route from Mangaluru to Kerala. To ease the traffic movement on the eastern side of the bridge, the Mangaluru Traffic Police has, on a temporary basis, made it a two-way stretch.
Mangaluru City Police Commissioner Anupam Agrawal, admitted that the slow movement of vehicles on the bridge is on account of the repair work and clarified that the work is expected to continue for 10 days. He also confirmed that the traffic police were regulating and temporarily allowing two-way traffic movement on the eastern side bridge to allow smooth traffic flow especially during peak hours.
The NHAI had also responded to a viral video of a pothole on the NH 66 to highlight the poor state of the roads by getting the pothole filled up. The road users had complained of car tyres bursting and the vehicles getting damaged on account of major potholes on the highway, where iron rods were also seen protruding, leading the NHAI to take action in the matter.
