By IANS
New Delhi : The National Herald, the newspaper started by India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, and its Urdu edition the Quami Awaz will come out with their last editions Tuesday, April 1, following a notice of “temporary suspension of publication”.
The editions of both dailies will carry a terse notice Tuesday announcing the “temporary suspension”, said its editor-in-chief T.V. Venkitachalam, who was associated with the National Herald for 20 years.
“The temporary closure of National Herald and Quami Awaz was announced by the management of the Associated Journals Ltd, which publishes the paper,” Venkitachalam told the IANS.
The National Herald and Quami Awaz Employees Union and Congress leaders had worked out the modalities towards a final settlement for the 265 employees, including about 40 journalists of the English and the Urdu editions published from New Delhi.
The employees will get their cheques for Voluntary Retirement Scheme April 2, as April 1 is a bank holiday.
Overstaffing, mainly of the press and non-journalists, and also lack of advertisements revenue are said to be the main causes for the newspaper running into major losses.
The newspaper was started in Lucknow Sep 9, 1938 by Nehru. The Lucknow edition of the paper closed down 10 years ago.