The history of mass media in India can be traced back to the late 18th century

when the first newspaper, The Bengal Gazette, was published in 1780 by James
Augustus Hickey. However, it was only in the 19th century that the mass media
gained significant momentum with the introduction of the printing press and the
increasing literacy rates among the people.
During the British colonial period, newspapers played a crucial role in
disseminating information and shaping public opinion. The first Indian language
newspaper, Samachar Darpan, was published in Bengali in 1818. In 1857, during
the Indian Rebellion, newspapers played a critical role in spreading news and
views among the masses.
The 20th century saw the emergence of new forms of mass media such as radio,
cinema, and television. Radio broadcasting started in India in 1927 with the
establishment of the Indian Broadcasting Company. The All India Radio (AIR) was
established in 1936 and it became the main source of information and
entertainment for the masses. Cinema, too, became a popular form of mass media,
with the first Indian feature film, Raja Harishchandra, being released in 1913.
Television broadcasting began in India in 1959 with the launch of Doordarshan.
In the post-independence period, mass media in India underwent significant
changes with the emergence of private media companies and the liberalization of
the media industry. The 1990s saw the emergence of satellite television, which
brought in a new era of 24-hour news channels and entertainment channels. The
rise of the internet and social media in the 21st century has further transformed the
mass media landscape in India, with online news portals and social networking
sites becoming popular sources of information and communication.
Today, mass media in India is a diverse and vibrant industry, with a large number
of newspapers, magazines, radio stations, television channels, and online media
outlets catering to different segments of the population.
Indian Media consist of several different types of communications: television,
radio, cinema, newspapers, magazines, and Internet-based Web sites/portals. Indian
media was active since the late 18th century with print media started in 1780, radio
broadcasting initiated in 1927, and the screening of Auguste and Louis Lumière
moving pictures in Bombay initiated during the July of 1895. It is among the oldest
and largest media of the world. Media in India has been free and independent
throughout most of its history, even before establishment of Indian empire by
Ashoka the Great on the foundation of righteousness, openness, morality and
spirituality. The period of emergency (1975–1977), declared by Prime Minister
Indira Gandhi, was the brief period when India's media was faced with potential
government retribution.
History Of Journalism & Mass Communication in India
The country consumed 99 million newspaper copies as of 2007 - making it the
second largest market in the world for newspapers. By 2009, India had a total of
81,000,000 Internet users - comprising 7.0% of the country's population, and
7,570,000 people in India also had access to broadband Internet as of 2010 -
making it the 11th largest country in the world in terms of broadband Internet
users. As of 2009, India is among the 4th largest television broadcast stations in the
world with nearly 1,400 stations. Snapshot of evolution of media in India is as
below:
Mass media in India - Bengal: The Bengal Gazette was started by James Augustus
Hicky in 1780. The Gazette, a two-sheet newspaper, specialised in writing on the
private lives of the Sahibs of the Company. He dared even to mount scurrillious
attacks on the Governor-General, Warren Hastings', wife, which soon landed "the
late printer to the Honourable Company" in trouble.
Hicky was sentenced to a 4 months jail term and Rs.500 fine, which did not deter
him. After a bitter attack on the Governor-General and the Chief Justice, Hicky
was sentenced to one year in prison and fined Rs.5,000, which finally drove him to
penury. These were the first tentative steps of journalism in India. Mass media in
India - Calcutta: B.Messink and Peter Reed were pliant publishers of the India
Gazette, unlike their infamous predecessor. The colonial establishment started the
Calcutta Gazette. It was followed by another private initiative the Bengal Journal.
The Oriental Magazine of Calcutta Amusement, a monthly magazine made it four
weekly newspapers and one monthly magazine published from Calcutta, now
Kolkata.
Mass media in India - Madras Chennai: The Madras Courier was started in 1785 in
the southern stronghold of Madras, which is now called Chennai. Richard Johnson,
its founder, was a government printer. Madras got its second newspaper when, in
1791, Hugh Boyd, who was the editor of the Courier quit and founded the Hurkaru.
Tragically for the paper, it ceased publication when Boyd passed away within a
year of its founding.
It was only in 1795 that competitors to the Courier emerged with the founding of
the Madras Gazette followed by the India Herald. The latter was an "unauthorised"
publication, which led to the deportation of its founder Humphreys. The Madras
Courier was designated the purveyor of official information in the Presidency. In
1878, The Hindu was founded, and played a vital role in promoting the cause of
Indian independence from the colonial yoke. It's founder, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar,
was a lawyer, and his son, K Srinivasan assumed editorship of this pioneering
newspaper during for the first half of the 20th century. Today this paper enjoys the
highest circulation in South India, and is among the top five nationally.
Mass media in India - Bombay: Bombay, now Mumbai, surprisingly was a late
starter - The Bombay Herald came into existence in 1789. Significantly, a year
later a paper called the Courier started carrying advertisements in Gujarati.
The first media merger of sorts: The Bombay Gazette, which was started in 1791,
merged with the Bombay Herald the following year. Like the Madras Courier, this
new entity was recognised as the publication to carry "official notifications and
advertisements". 'A Chronicle of Media and the State', by Jeebesh Bagchi in the
Sarai Reader 2001 is a handy timeline on the role of the state in the development of
media in India for more than a century.
Bagchi divides the timeline into three 'ages'. The Age of Formulation, which starts
with the Indian Telegraph Act in 1885 and ends with the Report of the Sub-
Committee on Communication, National Planning Committee in 1948.
Role of mass media
State of Modern Mass Media: After Independence, the Indian media had evolved,
realigned and reinvented itself to a large extent, and now-a-days you can see a
clear division between commercial and aesthetic expressions of our Media Giants,
sometimes arbitrary. Modern mass communication media is poles apart relative to
any aesthetic feeling: vulgarity and arrogance nullify any hypothesis of meaning.
Aesthetics is the more powerful answer to violence of modern mass
communication. Today’s mass communication media seems to elude every
determination, exposing its message to all possible variants, it finishes to abolish it.
Goal of mass communication is always the unbiased dissipation of any content,
and the world wide web is no exception, and surely is the most efficient media
tool.
It’s also very interesting to observe how the old media are becoming more and
more permeable to blogs and D.I.Y. information. This phenomenon is not due to a
fascination in more democratic information sources. On the contrary - the pressure
is rising due to the growth of the eyes’ (cameras and new digital devices) that are
watching the same events that mainstream media are reporting to us: the possibility
of being uncovered are too many and broadcast journalists are forced to tell the
truth (or at least a plausible version of it). As a consequence, blogs have become
the major source of news and information about many global affairs. We also have
to consider that bloggers are often the only real journalists, as they (at their own
risk) provide independent news in countries where the mainstream media is
censored, biased or under control.