After a hiatus of several months, The Background is back on the track again. This is not the best of time to run a portal, but we think this itself gives us the impetus to carry on. When we first started our portal in February 2019, we wanted to do many things at one go. We wanted to go in for writing, production as well as publishing. It was doubtless an ambitious task to accomplish. But as time went by and as the world was turned upside down by a lethal virus in 2020, we had to curtail our ambition. Throughout the last couple of years, we went in fits and starts on our activities. Our postings were irregular and also it was not reaching to readers as desired. We felt it was necessary to remold ourselves. Thus we paused for a while and took a deep breath to introspect. We took a unanimous decision for an overhauling of the portal on a massive scale.
Thus, we rejigged the design, which took us some time to figure it out. We had already changed the URL. The English portal is here (https://backgroundenglish.com). We would launch the Bengali portal soon. The co-founder of this portal Abdul Matin had been saying all along that slow journalism is the way forward for us and I can’t agree with him more. Given the circumstances we are in, we would like to upload at least four stories on a weekly basis. Besides this, we would be introducing a podcast section. I think this genre is way too little explored in this part of our country. The podcast would be divided into several sections.
As we begin The Background 2.0, we would reiterate our resolution once again:
This independent media platform will not be a part of corrupt Macho corporate sponsored Media house where it is absolutely unimaginable to even think of representing people’s voices. Here voices mean voices at the margins, the everyday lives of diverse heterogeneous working class, forced migrants, Tribals, Dalit, downtrodden Muslims and marginalized women.
We will stick to it in all surety.
Lastly, it takes time building up an ecosystem which can provide you unbreaking news, incisive analysis and opinions that matter. With our meagre financial resources and a small team, it is difficult for us to grow an independent media platform. Please extend your help by making a contribution of any amount. You can send your contribution to:
Bandhan Bank
A/C Name- The Background Trust
A/C No- 10210002315235
IFS Code: BDBL0001759
Warmest Regards,
Najib Anwar
Editor, The Background
