A few minutes after an earthquake ravaged Nepal on April 25, Dinmani Pande's phone in Mumbai began to ring. So did Bhumilal Poude’s. The calls were from their contacts in Nepal who wanted to speak first to the editors of the only two Nepali daily newspapers outside Sikkim and Siliguri.
Bhumilal Poude, 45, is the editor of Nepal News, the older of the two dailies. Dinamani Pande, 34, edits the newer Nepal Darpan. Like many diasporic newspapers, these dailies normally use wire agency reports or freelance stories from Nepal to fill their pages. But following the quake, they have both dug deeper than before to find stories for their readers that go beyond agency reports. What has also enabled them to shift their entire focus to their journalism is the fact neither of their families was around the quake’s epicentre and are well.
“We normally cover the news of small areas, but this is so big, we can’t do justice to it in our paper,” said Poude of Nepal News. Even Nepal’s thriving community radio stations, on which Poude relies most for local news, are still struggling to return to capacity.
In normal times, Nepal has one of the world’s densest network community radio stations, many of which avail of the services of free unlimited internet uploads offered by the government. These are run largely without government interference and carry hyperlocal news that Nepalese readers in Mumbai crave, Poude said.
But with these services affected, networks of friends are phoning in with the latest updates, even as they attempt to deal with their own worries. One of Poude’s friends, for instance, was in Varanasi at the time of the earthquake. Despite leaving immediately, she reached Kathmandu only last Tuesday evening – and even now is unable to find her house.
More than community radio, Facebook and WhatsApp connections with journalist friends now form the base of Pande’s networks.
One of his team of four staffers returned to Nepal almost immediately, but he decided to stay in Mumbai. “Ever since then, I have been meeting and talking to the community, trying to raise awareness and organise any relief work,” said Pande.
Poude echoed the sentiment: “If I go back, what will I do? I can do much more by staying here, but my going there will not be as important.”
Nepalese in Mumbai
Are there enough Nepalese in Mumbai to sustain not one but two daily newspapers?
“There is no part of India the Nepalese haven’t gone,” Poude said, laughing. “We are everywhere.”
There are 196 registered Nepali publications in India, of which only 16 are dailies and only three are outside Sikkim or Siliguri. Delhi’s Nepal Awaz is no longer active. Only Poude’s Nepal News and Pande’s Nepal Darpan, both eight-page tabloids, remain in print. They serve readers not just in Mumbai, but Pune, Nashik and even Vapi in Gujarat.
Nepal News, the older of the two, which started in 2002, has a print run of around 10,000 copies each day. Nepal Darpan, which started in 2011, has almost 6,000. Both focus on news from Nepal, but also smatter their pages with community events in Mumbai.
Poude and Pande might run Nepali newspapers, but both were born in India and lived much of their lives here.
Poude was born in Dibrugarh to Nepalese parents, but left for Nepal with his family when he was 10 because of insurgency fears. He has been a journalist for over 20 years, first in Nepal, where he worked with a friend’s newspaper in Gorkha district. He moved to Mumbai 15 years ago, after which he started Nepal News in 2002 as a Friday weekly. In 2006, Poude turned the publication into a daily with a staff of five.
Pande began his stint in journalism in 2000 at the age of 19 with a magazine called Nepali Yuva. A few months after it hit the stands, Intelligence Bureau officials arrived at his house to find out, and possibly arrest, the person behind the unregistered monthly. On seeing how young he was, they left after explaining the registration process to him.
By 2006, however, Pande wanted to move on. He worked for a while as a Mumbai stringer for a Nepali news agency, studied journalism and joined the Free Press Journal for a few years. Restless again in 2011, he quit and started Nepal Darpan as a weekly and in 2012 scaled it up to a daily.
The two work around the clock to produce a mix of city updates, such as the latest on bus fares or community events, readers’ contributions of poetry, songs and essays, as well as reports from home on the latest in Nepalese entertainment, cinema and politics. Most of their readership comes from just one region, Nepal’s Far Western division, which was not severely affected by the earthquake. Nepal Darpan dedicates an entire page to news from that division.
How do they keep in touch with their roots given the nature of their jobs?
“With community radio, you get a sense of people’s feelings, you get to listen to every tiny matter that is important to them,” Poude said. “And by listening to that, we also keep in touch with our original language.”
Indians in Nepal
Both Poude and Pande are exceptionally warm about India’s immediate response to the earthquake – but mostly in comparison to Nepal’s own response, widely seen as sluggish.
“The Nepal government is dull,” Pande said. “India was the first to respond, but how will they know where to send relief if our government doesn’t tell them where to go? The situation is so bad there that there’s really no need for us to give money from India. This is going to be the lottery for [Nepalese] politicians because they’re going to get so much money from around the world.”
Poude went a step further. This, he said, was a fine acknowledgment of the age-old links between the countries.
“Nepalese people are stationed across the border of India, and at the gate of every Indian home, but we were not sure if Indians cared about us,” Poude said. “Now that Narendra Modi responded so soon, we felt good. Now we will want to come back to India because we know our countries are truly sisters.”
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Bhumilal Poude, 45, is the editor of Nepal News, the older of the two dailies. Dinamani Pande, 34, edits the newer Nepal Darpan. Like many diasporic newspapers, these dailies normally use wire agency reports or freelance stories from Nepal to fill their pages. But following the quake, they have both dug deeper than before to find stories for their readers that go beyond agency reports. What has also enabled them to shift their entire focus to their journalism is the fact neither of their families was around the quake’s epicentre and are well.
“We normally cover the news of small areas, but this is so big, we can’t do justice to it in our paper,” said Poude of Nepal News. Even Nepal’s thriving community radio stations, on which Poude relies most for local news, are still struggling to return to capacity.
In normal times, Nepal has one of the world’s densest network community radio stations, many of which avail of the services of free unlimited internet uploads offered by the government. These are run largely without government interference and carry hyperlocal news that Nepalese readers in Mumbai crave, Poude said.
But with these services affected, networks of friends are phoning in with the latest updates, even as they attempt to deal with their own worries. One of Poude’s friends, for instance, was in Varanasi at the time of the earthquake. Despite leaving immediately, she reached Kathmandu only last Tuesday evening – and even now is unable to find her house.
More than community radio, Facebook and WhatsApp connections with journalist friends now form the base of Pande’s networks.
One of his team of four staffers returned to Nepal almost immediately, but he decided to stay in Mumbai. “Ever since then, I have been meeting and talking to the community, trying to raise awareness and organise any relief work,” said Pande.
Poude echoed the sentiment: “If I go back, what will I do? I can do much more by staying here, but my going there will not be as important.”
Nepalese in Mumbai
Are there enough Nepalese in Mumbai to sustain not one but two daily newspapers?
“There is no part of India the Nepalese haven’t gone,” Poude said, laughing. “We are everywhere.”
There are 196 registered Nepali publications in India, of which only 16 are dailies and only three are outside Sikkim or Siliguri. Delhi’s Nepal Awaz is no longer active. Only Poude’s Nepal News and Pande’s Nepal Darpan, both eight-page tabloids, remain in print. They serve readers not just in Mumbai, but Pune, Nashik and even Vapi in Gujarat.
Nepal News, the older of the two, which started in 2002, has a print run of around 10,000 copies each day. Nepal Darpan, which started in 2011, has almost 6,000. Both focus on news from Nepal, but also smatter their pages with community events in Mumbai.
Poude and Pande might run Nepali newspapers, but both were born in India and lived much of their lives here.
Poude was born in Dibrugarh to Nepalese parents, but left for Nepal with his family when he was 10 because of insurgency fears. He has been a journalist for over 20 years, first in Nepal, where he worked with a friend’s newspaper in Gorkha district. He moved to Mumbai 15 years ago, after which he started Nepal News in 2002 as a Friday weekly. In 2006, Poude turned the publication into a daily with a staff of five.
Pande began his stint in journalism in 2000 at the age of 19 with a magazine called Nepali Yuva. A few months after it hit the stands, Intelligence Bureau officials arrived at his house to find out, and possibly arrest, the person behind the unregistered monthly. On seeing how young he was, they left after explaining the registration process to him.
By 2006, however, Pande wanted to move on. He worked for a while as a Mumbai stringer for a Nepali news agency, studied journalism and joined the Free Press Journal for a few years. Restless again in 2011, he quit and started Nepal Darpan as a weekly and in 2012 scaled it up to a daily.
The two work around the clock to produce a mix of city updates, such as the latest on bus fares or community events, readers’ contributions of poetry, songs and essays, as well as reports from home on the latest in Nepalese entertainment, cinema and politics. Most of their readership comes from just one region, Nepal’s Far Western division, which was not severely affected by the earthquake. Nepal Darpan dedicates an entire page to news from that division.
How do they keep in touch with their roots given the nature of their jobs?
“With community radio, you get a sense of people’s feelings, you get to listen to every tiny matter that is important to them,” Poude said. “And by listening to that, we also keep in touch with our original language.”
Indians in Nepal
Both Poude and Pande are exceptionally warm about India’s immediate response to the earthquake – but mostly in comparison to Nepal’s own response, widely seen as sluggish.
“The Nepal government is dull,” Pande said. “India was the first to respond, but how will they know where to send relief if our government doesn’t tell them where to go? The situation is so bad there that there’s really no need for us to give money from India. This is going to be the lottery for [Nepalese] politicians because they’re going to get so much money from around the world.”
Poude went a step further. This, he said, was a fine acknowledgment of the age-old links between the countries.
“Nepalese people are stationed across the border of India, and at the gate of every Indian home, but we were not sure if Indians cared about us,” Poude said. “Now that Narendra Modi responded so soon, we felt good. Now we will want to come back to India because we know our countries are truly sisters.”