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Deepavali is here, and so are we

deepavaliHow has this teeny little news magazine, publishing insightful stories staffed by two and a half journalists and dozens of collaborators survived for 8 years now, winning countless awards along the way?

Conventional wisdom says this is impossible – that one needs big money to run a media operation. But we are not conventional!

At the beginning a handful of patrons believed in our idea, but now it is hundreds of ordinary citizens like you who keep us running.

You are a stakeholder in Citizen Matters! That’s what makes it a democratic, participative and collaborative medium! We aim to bring out stories and information that would otherwise have been lost inside hyperlocal silos that characterise Bangalore. Some examples of collaborative projects:

  • Investigative stories on wetlands destruction, building violations, compost scam, etc.
  • Neighbourhood Improvement Template (with Sanjay Nagar and Whitefield)
  • Tanker water pricing study
  • Garbage spot mapping

Each of these hugely impactful projects have resulted in action through awareness and protest, as well as PIL and government action.

A few months ago, we joined hands with the good folks at Radio Active to set up a community media lab. The Co Media Lab now serves as a resource centre, newsroom and a space for dialogues and discussions for community collaborations.

And now, we are working on some global projects too. The Co Media Lab is partnering with the Emmy award-winning International Reporting Program at the University of British Columbia.

And more exciting stuff in the pipeline that you will be hearing about in the coming weeks!

It’s only your contributions that help run this operation. Your donation goes towards supporting committed journalists like Akshatha and Shree, developing new programmes with partners, and working with interns, trainee journalists and citizen experts. (And we need a little bit more this time to sort out a server crash issue!)

This festive season, we once again reach out to you for your support. Our target is Rs 5 Lakhs – can you make it possible?

https://oorvani.org/support-us

Wish you a great festive season!

Meera K

Managing Trustee, Oorvani Foundation