D Ramachandram’s house in Hyderabad used to look like a mini library. The PR professional subscribed to 40 newspapers, including business dailies in English, Telugu, Hindi and Urdu. “The same set of papers used to be delivered to my office also. When newspaper vendors did not work, I missed the morning routine of reading newspapers; I felt something amiss in life,” he recalls the early 15 days of total lockdown phase.
Also a journalism student, Ramachandram who established the Hyderabad-based PR firm Solus Media, launched an initiative to support the print industry. Since April, he and his team members Devraj Solanki, Shiva Katighar, Sandeep Valluri, Rakesh Dhannarapu, Anil Deval, G Ashok Kumar and Vijay Kailash Beervas created 20 short videos on ‘Future of Newspapers’ and posted them on social media and to members of his broadcast groups.
One of the videos shows the teenagers’ opinion on newspapers, thus dispelling the myth that millennials do not favour the print media. In the 150 webinars that he attended during the last two months, his one question to experts have been on newspapers’ survival. “I would ask them to tell me the newspapers’ story. I have also spoken to different media houses to generate opinion. This project doesn’t favour any one newspaper; It is to support the print industry,” he says, adding the PR industry and its livelihood are also dependent on newspapers. “I am doing this to support our industry too,” he says.
He began reading The Hindu as a teenager to improve his English. “I loved reading my daily dose of Telugu newspapers and picked up The Hindu to make my English communication easier,” he says.
Ramachandram asserts he will continue to make such videos to show why print still rules. He adds, “Now we are sourcing newspaper dress from Jaipur to bring awareness and show how a newspaper is valuable.”
