The Tamil Nadu government on Thursday constituted the Journalists’ Welfare Board for the first time in the state with an intention to ensure welfare of working journalists. The board comprises of state government officials, owners of media houses and senior journalists as its members.
An announcement on the formation of the Tamil Nadu Journalists’ Welfare Board had been made by Information and Publicity Minister M.P. Saminathan way back in 2021, during the budget session after the DMK assumed power.
As per the Government Order issued on Thursday, Minister Saminathan will be the chairperson of board which will have six senior officials from various government departments as members along with six non-official members. The official members include secretaries from departments of finance, revenue and disaster administration, housing and labour welfare; land administration commissioner and director of Information and Public Relations.
The non-official members include media owners and journalists. They are Sivanthi Adithyan Balasubramanian of the Daily Thanthi group; R.M.R. Ramesh, publisher of Dinakaran, a daily newspaper from the Sun Network; B. Kolappan of The Hindu; S. Gavaskar from Theekathir; M Ramesh of Puthiya Thalaimurai, a leading Tamil channel; and Lakshmi Subramanian of The Week.
As per the GO issued by Maheshan Kasirajan, Secretary, Tamil Development and Information Department, the board has been set up to look into the welfare and ensure the benefits of working journalists. As per the GO, the existing journalists’ pension committee, under the government has been dissolved and merged with the newly set up board.
