‘Mumbai Samachar’: As India’s oldest newspaper turns 200, this is the story of its dynamic founder

Furdoonjee Marzbanjee, born into a family of Parsi priests, was a serial entrepreneur who migrated to Mumbai from Surat.

Murali Ranganathan

· Jul 01, 2022 · 08:30 am

India’s printing history is five centuries old. It needs printing museums to preserve this heritage

Nowhere is the story of print in India explored. Nowhere are the print practitioners of yesteryear celebrated.

Murali Ranganathan

· Aug 08, 2021 · 11:30 am

Jayant Meghani (1938-2020): Remembering the meticulous bookseller of Bhavnagar

How a Gujarati bookstore in Bhavnagar achieved cult status thanks to its founder, who died on December 4, at the age of 82.

Murali Ranganathan

· Dec 19, 2020 · 12:30 pm

How the Bombay plague shut down a human book factory: The life and death of Narayan Hemchandra

An extraordinary life of industrial strength writing, cut short by the killer disease.

Murali Ranganathan

· Dec 13, 2020 · 12:30 pm

How an Anglo-Gujarati newspaper kept publishing through the Bombay plague and into the 1980s

The long and eventful history of the weekly ‘Kaiser-i-Hind’.

Murali Ranganathan

· Aug 28, 2020 · 08:30 am

On JV Naik’s first death anniversary, remembering a life spent in pursuit of historical heroes

In his final years, he expressed dismay over declining research in India and politicisation of the country’s history.

Murali Ranganathan

· Jul 22, 2020 · 07:30 am

How the first English novels by Parsis were written in the backdrop of the plague and politics

The histories of the novels ‘My Friend, The Barrister’ and ‘Pootli, A Story of Life in Bombay’.

Murali Ranganathan

· Jul 11, 2020 · 11:30 am

How the name of a Gujarati language printer and publisher who died in the plague lives on in Mumbai

Jehangir B Karani’s business rose, fell and then rose again posthumously.

Murali Ranganathan

· Jun 28, 2020 · 08:30 am

How a Gujarati cookbook came to symbolise love and gratitude during the bubonic plague in Bombay

The story of Vividha Vaani.

Murali Ranganathan

· Jun 13, 2020 · 10:30 am

Mumbai has forgotten the ‘leading historian’ who once highlighted its forgotten past

JRB Jeejeebhoy, who wrote numerous pieces on the city and its heritage from the 1920s to the 1950s, has met the fate of his subjects.

Murali Ranganathan

· May 07, 2019 · 11:30 am