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Running without any institutional support, the award-winning community journalism, e-hyper-local, has been telling stories of Okhla daily since 2011! Whether it is Jamia Millia Islamia or Shaheen Bagh or Batla House, Jasola, Sarita Vihar, New Friends’ Colony or environment or health or toxic plant or women issues or lack of quality school, piled up garbage on roadsides, non-availability of drinking water, traffic snarl, low-quality buildings, overflowing sewage in this residential areas, the e-daily has covered every incident small or big all these years with some of its videos going viral and reports finding place in mainstream media.
And during Covid deadly 2nd wave, the OT was the only reliable source for Okhla residents. It braved danger to keep you updated daily with more than 300 original and verified reports about your beloved ones and covered the pandemic from ground zero. It was during this period that the OT busted fake news. Some of our reports were even followed by corporate-backed media. Also, the OT has been striving hard to bring right perspective to counter some media and powerful lobbies’ stereotyping of section of Indian society.
The portal, an initiative to strengthen local democracy and empowering the marginalised through digital inclusion, got global recognition when it was shortlisted for XCity London Award.
Over the years, the portal has mapped Okhla, covering developments and milestones of the deprived locality all long with ground breaking reports over years with high impact.
It was on the portal’s initiative that the Government agencies were convinced to correct the name of a freedom fighter and one of the founders of Jamia Millia Islamia, Mohammad Ali Jauhar, spelled incorrectly on a signage put in Okhla.
The portal has been profiled by mainstream media, including India Today and Tehelka.
Remember if you support big media organisations by paying to read their newspapers, why not support the OT and strengthen your voice? Contribute generously by taking our subscription so that your portal which all these years has been highlighting issues of the locality on a shoe-string budget expands its coverage.
The portal as you all know has been covering your stories with highly dedicated professionals but unpaid team, who work to bring you original reports from the ground as we rarely collate information from other sources.
We cannot grow without your support.
Operation IT Head: Faraz Akram
Food Editor and content Head: Javed Iqbal
Trainee reporter: Soumiya
Intermediary Head: Kamran Mallick
TESTIMONIALS
“After reading the OT it makes me feel that I am home in India at Jamia Millia Islamia among my people. The portal is doing wonderful work by bringing people close to each other.” Jatinder Kumar Anand (Peter), Canada-based Jamia alumnus
“To run a community portal is a difficult thing. Hats off!” Najeeb Jung, former vice chancellor Jamia Millia Islamia and former L-G Delhi
“Such news portals render great service to people to be more aware of their surroundings. More often than not the mainstream media ignore local news unless it is something sensational. Alternative news portals like theokhlatimes.com do what mainstream media fails to do. The OT has been highlighting the plights of local people. It is doing serious and honest journalism.” K Thirunavukkarasu, researcher, media analyst
“Good source of local information.” Ranjit Devraj, environmentalist
“People in the South here, including myself in Bangalore find the portal very informative as we get to know everything or rather most of the things happening in Okhla locality.” Nigar Ataullah, Bangalore-based journalist
“theokhlatimes.com is a community based news portal which has been working assiduously towards bringing into sharp focus news and issues relevant to the immediate community it caters to. At a time when the space for local and community news has been shrinking in mainstream media, the portal stands for all that is right and good about community journalism.” Dr Simi Malhotra, Jamia Millia Islamia
“I reside in Okhla and earlier people used to inform me about updates in the locality, but not anymore. Since I started reading the OT, I come to know about incidents taking place in the locality. I request you all to support the OT. It is my firm belief that as long as the OT is operational we will continue to get regular updates about many issues from the portal. Wish them best of luck.” RJ Naved, Radio jockey
“The OT is very informative platform. I read it regularly for local news. Their local coverage is good.” Suhail Anjum, senior journalist, Voice of America
“It was breaking news and human-interest story but nobody covered it. The OT ran it. Hats off to their community journalism! It was only after two days that an Editor from a vernacular press contacted me.” Shafique Ul Hasan, CEO Sky Advertising, journalist and a nationally-known scribe for his daily newspaper clippings