Independent News & Media, owners of the broadsheet paper The Independent, today announced that it was reducing its media investments in India.

The company was one of the first major media groups in the UK to consider investing in Indian newspapers a few years ago. It was quickly followed by Associated Newspapers and Reuters.
Continue reading…

The street magazine Big Issue, famously sold by homeless people to help them earn an income, is to launch in Lahore, Pakistan.

Its founder John Bird said: “Nowhere in the world needs The Big Issue like Pakistan right now.”

The Big Issue is already sold in nine countries including England, Scotland, Australia, the Republic of Ireland, South Africa, Japan, Namibia, Kenya and Malawi. It was was founded in 1991 by John Bird and Gordon Roddick, husband of the late Anita Roddick, the late founder of The Body Shop.

It has grown to become one of the UK’s leading social businesses.

Is media freedom being strangled across Commonwealth countries? That is the subject is a debate next week at Portcullis House in Westminster.

The event, organised by the Commonwealth Journalists Association (UK), why journalists are not better protected and media laws being ignored in many countries around the world.
Continue reading…

As part of the GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards Dinner 2009, the Asian Media and Marketing Group (AMG) are launching a hunt to find the country’s best young journalist from an ethnic minority background. The only criteria other than ability and talent is that they must be under the age of 30.

So if you know of a young talented journalist who deserves to be recognized, please nominate and help inspire the next generation of young journalists. The winner will receive a bursary cheque of £500 from the Daily Mail and will have the chance, if appropriate, of a week’s work experience on the newspaper. Closing date is Friday July 24th 2009.
Email: Minaxi Mistry / More info: GG2 Awards

The Guardian Newspaper has ended the fortnightly column of its sole regular Muslim columnist. Noorjehan Barmania (pictured) started writing for the paper in August 2007 for a special series called ‘This Muslim Life‘, for its G2 supplement.

It was positioned as a light hearted take on a woman “searching for her place in British society”.
Continue reading…

A BBC scheme to develop a diverse talent pool of journalists ends next week.

The BBC Journalism Talent Pool is designed to speed the recruitment of journalists by finding and assessing talented people from a range of backgrounds in advance of vacancies.
Continue reading…

The Council of Europe has launched a new campaign to challenge ethnic and race-based discrimination across its member states.

The Strasbourg, France, based organisation is comprised of 47 member countries across Europe and has already launched ad campaigns across various countries.

Continue reading…

Journalist Deepa Shah has left The Times newspaper after working as commissioning editor on its Body & Soul supplement. She also worked as an editor on its new Weekend section.

Before The Times, Ms shah freelanced as a writer or editor for Look, Woman, at Daily Mirror supplements and on magazines launches for News International and IPC. She was also a senior writer at Closer magazine, a reporter for the Evening Standard, The Sunday Times, The Observer and the Mail among others. She started her career at Eastern Eye where she was eventually News Editor.

On 7th January the Sun newspaper splashed with a front-page story alleging that Muslim extremists on internet forum were drawing up a “hit-list” of prominent British Jewish figures, including businessman Alan Sugar and musician Mark Ronson.

But it may turn out the story isn’t true after an investigation by political bloggers alleged the ‘extremist’ in question may actually be the expert quoted in the original Sun story.
Continue reading…

Zee TV will host its annual Zee Carnival from 13th to 15th February at Olympia, London, despite worries that the recession will hold back Asian visitors.
Continue reading…

Eastern Eye isn’t the first title to face major economic problems at Ethnic Media Group. In fact, as long as the company has been around, it has gone through a myriad of niche publications targeting blacks and Asians. Many failed, others were sold off.

This handy list might offer some idea of how the industry has changed over the years.
Continue reading…

Ethnic Media Group’s decision to sell off its flagship Asian newspaper Eastern Eye represents a big change in its long, turbulent history.

In a statement to AIM magazine today, editor Hamant Verma said: “Now that we no longer have to subsidise New Nation, I hope that Eastern Eye may at long last have the resources to realise its full potential.”

That suggests significant internal tensions over how EMG’s two main newspapers were faring and possibly points to a struggle over resources.
Continue reading…

Asian newspaper Eastern Eye has been sold by its owner Ethnic Media Group (EMG) to another company, AIM magazine can exclusively reveal. The deal was completed today afternoon.

Eastern Eye is now owned by Asian Media & Marketing Group (AMG), which also publishes Garavi Gujarat, GG2 Life magazine, Asian Trader and other publications in the UK.

EMG’s other flagship publication, New Nation, which is aimed at British Africans and Carribeans, is still up for sale.
Continue reading…

Asian Woman magazine will be hosting its annual Asian Bride Show this weekend – Saturday 24th and Sunday 25th January. The event will be held at London’s Wembley Stadium.

The event will feature designers, photographers, beauticians, caterers, cars, wedding businesses and brands from around the world. It will also showcase latest designs on a model catwalk and music acts throughout both days.

British journalist Sathnam Sanghera may not be very welcome in Dubai, going by his recent column in the The Times newspaper. But then, he obviously doesn’t want to go either. In a column for the newspaper he explained his reasons for: ‘Why I’d rather die than visit Dubai’.

That editorial sparked off a furious response in the Dubai press, with one resident alerting AIM Magaine to a column in The National newspaper, taking Sanghera to task.

AIM magazine previously profiled Sathnam Sanghera and then interviewed him earlier this year during the publication of his book, If You Don’t Know Me By Now.

So what sparked it all off? Sathnam wrote about Dubai: “Essentially it is Las Vegas without the sex and gambling, which is Las Vegas without a point.”
Continue reading…

Sunday Times media correspondent Dipesh Gadher has been appointed deputy news editor at the weekly paper, it was reported this week.

The 33 year-old journalist, who started his journalist career at Asian paper Eastern Eye, has been with the paper for 10 years.
Continue reading…

Nafeesa Shan, a reporter on the Lancashire Telegraph, last night won the GG2 Young Journalist of the Year award.

The GG2 awards are an annual event held by Asian Media & Marketing Group to award high achievers in various categories. In total 11 awards were handed out.

Nafeesa was also shortlisted for Young Journalist of the Year at this year’s 17th annual North West Newspaper Awards.

27 year old journalist Angela Saini has left the BBC to go freelance.
AIM magazine asks whether it was a wise decision to make, and why.

You’ve just won an award for your work at the BBC. Why leave now?

Although I love news reporting, I always really wanted to be a science journalist. Winning a high-profile award for a major investigation opened up lots of doors, but rather than go down a route not meant for me, I decided to follow my dream.

Continue reading…

Eastern Eye announced yesterday that it was planning to hold its annual Asian Business Awards on 19th November.

As with every year, the ABAs will be accompanied by Success magazine – which will publish an up-to-date audit of wealth for the richest 20 Asians in the UK and India’s 20 richest Indians. The magazine is published only once a year by Eastern Eye.

The Asian Business Awards will take place at Wembley Stadium.
www.easterneyeuk.co.uk

Do you believe in magic?

This question was asked on air the other day. As it was on the BBC Asian Network, there was a huge response. One caller called in with a sworn statement of how an auntie was taken ill without any cause (virus maybe?), and when they threw away some flour and hair found in her hand bag, she was well again!

Then there was a doctor, who at a certain price will rid you of this ailment. And he said he had a degree from a certain university and was a “professional”.
Continue reading…

London based magazine Brit Asian has re-launched its website to attract new audiences, the editor told AIM magazine. The freely distributed entertainment magazine launched in Summer 2006 and focuses on Bollywood, British urban, Bhangra and general lifestyle features.

Editor Rick Parmar said: “I’m extremely excited by the new website as we fill the gap in British Asian tastes and trends online, bringing what we do in the magazine, but more rapidly to readers on a daily basis. We were the first and only magazine that brought to you the likes of Shilpa Shetty mixed in with exclusives from the likes of music artist Fergie, don’t expect anything less at Brit-Asian.com!”
www.brit-asian.com

by Anna Roxelana Ward

Many students would be daunted by the prospect of doing an intensive journalism course at the London School of Journalism (LSJ) during their summer holidays. Aasiyah Dana (pictured) has wasted no time since graduating this year from Queen Mary’s with a 1st in English Literature.

She enrolled on the four-week course which cost £1395 and is accredited by the National Union of Journalists (NUJ). She is due to start her internship this September at The Guardian newspaper.

How did you find time to study and do work-experience in journalism while at University?

Discipline is everything! I guess it helps that I’m a perfectionist; it means that once I set myself a deadline I absolutely have to stick to it. I don’t think you can study literature or be a journalist half-heartedly; you really need to be passionate about it and I found this attitude helped me to create a balance so I could do both at the same time.
Continue reading…

It is always good to be an outsider looking in. I had the chance of doing that recently when I was away in India for more than a month.

There are lots of things we take for granted, and don’t realise that we have some of the best systems and regulations in force in this country.

Broadly, freedom and the responsibility of the press is one of them. The press are mostly constrained and law abiding and the same goes for the police. On the whole our police are hard working and follow the letter of the law. There are exceptions of course. But they are few and far between.
Continue reading…

The Daily Mail on Friday published an extensive profile piece on actress and writer Meera Syal, with an interview about her career.

I can’t imagine there are many things left on Meera’s wish list. ‘It’s funny how your goalposts move as you get older,’ she agrees, self-deprecatingly.

‘In my 20s, I wanted to win an Oscar; in my 30s, I thought a Bafta would do, and these days, I have huge respect for people who are just able to survive and make a living as well as maintaining family life.’ But Meera is light years away from being your average working mother – she is a multi-talented overachiever with a dizzying number of accomplishments to her credit.

There are two bestselling novels, Anita And Me, and Life Isn’t All Ha Ha Hee Hee, both of which were adapted for the screen. On top of that, she has written several other screenplays; had a number one Comic Relief pop hit, Spirit In The Sky, with Gareth Gates; and wrote the script for the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Bombay Dreams.

Another day, another Daily Mail outrage. A Scottish police force’s new telephone number has sparked outrage from the Daily Mail after it found out that some Muslim shopkeepers could object to displaying the advert on their windows because it featured the picture of a puppy.

The newspaper declared that the advert had sparked “Muslim outrage” at the police advert, without actually finding anyone who was sufficiently outraged. One councillor Mohammed Asif did point out that: “My concern was that it’s not welcomed by all communities, with the dog on the cards. It was probably a waste of resources going to these communities.

They (the police) should have understood. Since then, the police have explained that it was an oversight on their part, and that if they’d seen it was going to cause upset they wouldn’t have done it.”