Mumbai, June 9 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend the bicentenary celebrations of “Mumbai Samachar” – India’s oldest continuously published broadsheet Gujarati daily, it was announced here on Thursday.
Prior to that, the PM will inaugurate a Gallery of Revolutionaries at Raj Bhavan next Tuesday.
“Mumbai Samachar” was started as a small bunch of pamphlets on July 1, 1822 by a Parsi priest-cum-scholar, Fardunjee Murazban, considered the pioneer of Gujarati journalism, through the country’s first printing press which he had launched in 1812.
It catered to the thriving business community of Bombay, as it was known then, providing biz-related news, death announcements and shipping time-tables as all trade was routed through the Bombay Port, its present-day owner-Director Hormusji N. Cama had told IANS last year as the paper entered the 200th year of publication.
Over the two centuries of its existence, it faithfully catered to all the “bijness” communities, witnessed history as the Seven Isles of Bombay gradually transformed into today’s Mumbai – the country’s financial-glamour power capital and remains a favourite of all Gujarati-speaking clans like Parsis, Hindus, Jain, Dawoodi Bohras, Khojas, Memons, et al, living and thriving in the port city.
During the freedom struggle, stalwarts like Mahatma Gandhiji, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel were frequent visitors to the “Bombay Samachar” offices and discussed politics over tea and snacks.