Owners are also editors at 93% newspapers in Bangladesh

The owners of 93 percent of newspapers in Bangladesh are also their editors.

There are 1,078 newspapers in Bangladesh said Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu, in reply to a question in Parliament on Tuesday. “Among them, 1,005 of their editors are their owners.”  

That leaves 73 newspapers or only seven percent with professional editors.    

Inu also said 434 of the 1,078 dailies are listed in the media.

Chittagong-11 MP MA Latif, who posed the written question, also asked about daily subscription details, the printing presses used by various newspapers and the method used by government to monitor them.

“The government through the Department of Film and Publication only monitors media-listed newspapers and the number of copies they print every day.

“The printer is mentioned in the printer’s line in the newspapers’ Inu said.

As for the television channels, he said the state-owned BTV, BTV World and other private channels were aired across the world through cable networks.

There is no legal barrier for viewing them in neighbouring India but the cable operators there are ‘not interested’, said the minister.

But an agreement was in process to air BTV through a channel by India’s state-owned Doordarshan using the Direct to Home (DTH) technology, he said.