People across the world are opting for social networking sources for news but The Bengalee Association, Bihar, is trying to revive the oldest English tabloid of the state, Behar Herald.

Come July 15, the association would re-launch the newspaper at the Bihar Industries Association premises.

Education minister P.K. Shahi has consented to be the chief guest at the inaugural ceremony of the re-launch of the English tabloid, which also happens to be among one of the oldest English ones in the country. Of the awe-inspiring excerpts from the Behar Herald was - "Prime Minister Indira Gandhi during her recent visit to the drought-stricken districts of Bihar saw about ten lakh persons, mostly half-fed unemployed farmers and landless labourers who lined up the 80 mile route of the Prime Minister's car."

 

“The traders made the most of the draught situation in Bihar. There was sudden and unilateral decision of Patna bakers to increase the price of loaves. The government officials had found that some big traders had intentionally refused to take delivery of nearly 600 wagon- loads of maize imported from Punjab as they wanted to reap benefits in draught situation by showing scarcity of cereals.�

These are the excerpts of 144 year old English tabloid Behar Herald.

<>Talking about the reason behind re-launching the tabloid, Bengalee Association, Bihar, president Dilip Kumar Sinha, an orthopaedic surgeon, said: "The Bengali-speaking people should have a platform to discuss things that concerns their community as well as with other linguistic communities. This is the reason we thought of launching this English tabloid again.

The history of Behar Herald is very rich. Its journey started in 1874. It was first published by Guru Prasad Sen, a rich landlord from Dhaka, who had settled here. Sen, who used to practise as a lawyer also, shifted the ownership of this paper to Bengalee Association, Bihar, in 1938. Till 1987, the tabloid used to be published regularly. However, it was discontinued following financial crisis and other reasons. We are very proud to re-launch this English tabloid.

Association secretary Bidyut Pal said the tabloid would be published in the same format as it used to be published 141 years ago.

"The only difference would be that now the tabloid would be sold in colour instead of the black and white format earlier. Only July 15, we would start the tabloid with four pages. Later, we would increase four more pages. The tabloid originally had eight pages."

Talking about the features of the tabloid, Bishwanath Dey, joint secretary of Bengalee Association, Bihar, said: "We used to have a column, Patna Diary, in which we used to cover the happenings in Patna. Besides, we had All India Diary column also in which nation-related important news were given space. We would try to revive these columns in the tabloid."

Members of Bengalee Association, Bihar, seemed confident about the tabloid's popularity after its re-launch.

"There are around 13 lakh Bengalis in the state. People of the Bengalee community are well aware of this tabloid. So they would definitely like to stay connected with this tabloid while we are sure to win the hearts of people because our honest reporting and good local coverage," added Dey.