The festival of lights is here and I hope that it brings a great amount of positivity and life-affirming energy into your lives. But while I say this, I am also aware of the fact that we all live in a world which is torn by growing poverty and malnutrition, communal violence and racial oppression, the sustained destruction of the environment and a global rise in gender violence-amidst all this, is it possible to retain our sanity and pretend that all is well with us?
While there are no easy answers to these complex questions of existence, it is also true that we must never stop striving towards them. Let us continue to be deeply aware and sensitive to the world around us, let us learn to move out of our comfort zones and spread the positivity of love and humanity with others, let us look beyond the parochial identities of nationality, race, religion or caste and acknowledge that we are all a collective. One of the most important ways in which we can fight the darkness of ignorance that engulfs our world is through the nurturance of initiatives that work towards rebuilding and renovating the very fabric of our society.
One such important institution is that of quality and independent journalism that engages itself in telling the stories that really matter, in travelling and reporting on issues that impact the Indian grassroots, in analysing, commenting and generating a mature perspective on issues that shape our imagination whether it is from the realm of politics, economics, culture, education, environment or gender and arts.
Quality journalism is indeed the cornerstone of a vibrant and participatory democratic order and it enables the cultivation of an awakened, critical, reflexive and engaged citizenry. The New Leam has been an independent and courageous media organisation that has for the last many years worked intensely towards bringing out stories from the grassroots, in generating a critical and reflexive dialogue on important political/economic/cultural/environmental issues, in both generating as well as nurturing minds that keep the very ethos of democracy alive. It is through our wide and committed readership that we have been motivated and encouraged to continue this journey despite an absence of corporate or institutional funding. But as we brace ourselves to light up many illuminating lamps this Diwali, I take this opportunity to request and invite our readers to contribute generously into The New Leam so that we can continue our work with rigour and sustained quality.
Your contributions and well-wishes are vital for us and will remind us time and again of our responsibility and accountability to quality journalism.
We sincerely hope that you will come forward and make a donation this Diwali and ignite an important flame that keeps the spirit of quality-independent journalism alive. Please make a donation to The New Leam!
Happy Diwali!
Vikash Sharma
Editor/The New Leam
