Imphal Free Press is an English-language daily published in Manipur, India. Alongside the Sangai Express, it is one of the two most widely read newspapers of Manipur.[1][2][3] It is considered as one of the "good quality" newspapers, among approximately 40 papers in the state of Manipur.[3]
History
The original Imphal Free Press was owned by Sapam Nishikanta.[4] In 1996, Pradip Phanjoubam walked out with the name and started a new Imphal Free Press.[4][5] Phanjoubam edits and owns the new Imphal Free Press ever since.[6] Sapam Nishikanta continued publishing under the names Manipur Free Press that turned into the Sangai Express, now the main competitor of the Imphal Free Press.[1]
Assault and battery
In 2006, a faction of the Kangleipak Communist Party forced a ban of three months on the Imphal Free Press.[7] On 11 November 2008, an Imphal Free Press editor, Konsam Rishikant, was assassinated.[8][9]
^Misra, Neelesh (2012). The Absent State. Hachette India. p. 170. ISBN978-9350093665. The appointment of a new chief administrative officer in Tamenglong by the rebel administration was a front page story in the Imphal Free Press, the region's leading daily newspaper.
^ abDas, Jayanta Vishnu (2017). "Protests, resistance and violence: the collective performance of everyday images in Manipur". In Pathak, Dev Nath; Perera, Sasanka (eds.). Culture and Politics in South Asia: Performative Communication. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge. p. 142. ISBN978-1351656139 – via Google Books. The situation of the press thus can [be] described as at best precarious, although today Manipur boasts of almost 40-odd dailies being published from different parts of the state; most of them are local in nature and barely able to sustain themselves. Only with the coming of 'Imphal Free Press' in 1996 that Manipur got its first daily professionally run newspaper with Pradeep Phanjoubam as its editor. Today, The Sangai Express is known to be another good quality newspaper which has added value to the print media sector. But apart from these two dailies, newspapers have struggled with frequent brushes with the state and insurgents, and have left the editors with no elbow room to work at all.
^ abSamom, Thingnam Anjulika (2007). "Media under Siege. Media Functioning in an Armed Conflict Situation: A Case Study of Manipur". Social Action. 57 (4): 382–396 – via Google Books. The transition from letter press printing to offset printing by The Imphal Free Press (The Imphal Free Press referred to here is the newspaper owned by Sapam Nishikanta. Later on, the editor, Pradip Phanjaoubam, left the organisation and took the name with him, which he now uses for his own paper. Meanwhile, Sapam Nishikanta's paper briefly ran as the Manipur Free Press and was later christened The Sangai Express)
^Samom, Thingnam Anjulika (February 2009). "Manipur: The tussle and the compromise". Info Change India. Pune. Archived from the original on 16 October 2018. In April 2006, a faction of the Kangleipak Communist Party (KCP) held six Imphal-based newspaper editors hostage through the night and forced them to publish a statement about the outfit's "raising day" celebration which the editors had previously ignored. The KCP faction also clamped a three-month ban on the Imphal Free Press for misquoting an earlier statement.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
^Mehrotra, Deepti Priya (2009). Burning Bright Irom Sharmila. London: Penguin Books. p. 176. ISBN978-8184751536. On 17 November 2008, Konsam Rishikanta of the Imphal Free Press was shot dead by unknown gunmen—the sixth journalist to be killed in Manipur since 1993. When the media aired its suspicion about involvement of state police in the killing, there was no response from the state;