How This All-Female-Run Publisher Is Using Tech to Bring News to Rural India
Villages in Bundelkhand had no source for news until Khabar Lahariya came along
In recent years, the greatest challenge for the news industry has been to find a business model for the internet age as lucrative as the one that sustained it during the print era. If the internet is forcing reluctant evolution from legacy publishers, it is encouraging enthusiastic innovation for scrappy publishers like Khabar Lahariya.
Khabar Lahariya is a female-run publisher that serves news in parts of rural India that have historically existed in media dark zones. Since its founding in 2002, Khabar Lahariya, which translates to “news waves,” fulfills a dire need for information that is relevant, and often vital, to its communities — from regional politics and developmental programs to crime and women’s rights.
Until last year, Khabar Lahariya published a print newspaper in five rural districts in India’s Bundelkhand region. In these areas, literacy is low and sources of hyperlocal news were practically nonexistent. Given the constraints that come with a print format, it served only a fraction of people in these communities who could read. Khabar Lahariya estimates that with a circulation of 4,000, it served 40,000 people, with…
