Development of Indian Press Flashcards
started The Bengal Gazetteor Calcutta General Advertiser
James Augustus Hickey in 1780
Censorship of Press Act, 1799
Lord Wellesley enacted this, anticipating French invasion of India.
pre-censorship
relaxed under Lord Hasting
Licensing Regulations, 1823
The acting governor-general, John Adams, who had reactionary views, enacted these
starting or using a press without licence was a penal offence.
Rammohan Roy’s Mirat-ul-Akbar had to stop publication due to
Licensing Regulations, 1823
“liberator of the Indian press”.
Metcalfe (governor-general—1835-36)
required a printer/publisher to give a precise account of premises ofa publication and cease functioning,
Press Act of 1835 or Metcalfe Act
Press Act of 1835 or Metcalfe Act
registration procedure laid down
reserved the right to stop publication and
circulation of any book, newspaper or printed matter
Licensing Act, 1857
This replaced Metcalfe’s Act of 1835 and was of a regulatory, not restrictive
Registration Act, 1867
Registration Act, 1867
every book/ newspaper was required to print the name of the printer and the publisher and the place of the publication; and
(ii) a copy was to be submitted to the local government within one month of the publication of a book.
In 1883, became the first
Indian journalist to be imprisoned
Surendranath Banerjea
The Hindu and Swadesamitran under
G. Subramaniya Aiyar
Bengalee under
Surendranath Banerjea
Voice of India under
Dadabhai Naoroji
Amrita Bazar Patrika under
Sisir Kumar Ghosh and Motilal Ghosh
Indian Mirror under
N.N. Sen,
Kesari (in Marathi) and Maharatta (in English) under
Balgangadhar Tilak
Sudharak under
Gopal Krishna Gokhale
Hindustan and Advocate under
G.P. Verma
Tribune and Akbhar-i-am in
Punjab
Gujarati, Indu Prakash, Dhyan Prakash and Kal in
Bombay
Som Prakash, Banganivasi and Sadharani in
Bengal
Vernacular Press Act, 1878
The district magistrate was empowered to call upon
the printer and publisher of any vernacular newspaper to enter into a bond with the government
no appeal could’be made in a court of law
The Act came to be nicknamed “the gagging Act”.
Vernacular Press Act, 1878
Under VPA, proceedings were instituted against
Som Prakash, Bharat Mihir, Dacca Prakash and Samachar
turned overnight into an English newspaper to escape the VPA
Amrita Bazar Patrika
murder of the chairman of the Plague Committee
in Poona by
the Chapekar brothers
Tilak was arrested after the murder of Rand on the
basis of the publication of a poem
Shivaji’s Utterances
Newspaper (Incitement to Offences) Act, 1908
Act empowered the magistrates to confiscate press property which publishedobjectionable material likely to cause incitement to murder/ acts of violence
This Act revived the worst features of the VPA
Indian Press Act, 1910
Indian Press Act, 1910
submit two copies of each issue to local government free of charge.
local government was empowered to demand a security at registration
In 1921, on the recommendations of a Press
Committee chaired by the Press Acts of
1908 and 1910 were repealed
Tej Bahadur Sapru,
This Act gave sweeping powers to provincial governments to suppress propaganda for Civil Disobedience Movement
Indian Press (Emergency Powers) Act, 1931
Defence of India Rules were imposed for
repression ofpolitical agitation and free public criticism during the First World War.
