Financially troubled media house Zee Group has announced the sudden closure of its print venture, the Daily News & Analysis (DNA) on Wednesday.
In its official communique, the media giant announced that it is stopping print edition from Thursday and will go digital, keeping the changing reader preferences in consideration.
The last edition of the 14-year-old daily, which had already stopped its editions from Delhi and other centres earlier, will come out on Thursday from Mumbai and Ahmedabad, said the group.
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The Chandra family is under a major financial burden as some its business deals went awry and the liquidity crisis made it tough to repay the debt.
The group is selling its promoter holdings over 90 percent of it is pledged for repaying the lenders.
The group still owes nearly Rs 7,000 crore to the lenders despite repaying over Rs 6,500 crore since March.
“In this rapidly evolving market, a very thin line remains between the print and digital. There’s duplicity in print and digital readership and the trend shows that our readers, especially the youngsters, prefer reading on their mobiles rather than in print. Only the medium is changing, not us,” a front-page note by the editor said.
The write-up said that DNA is turning digital and sought reader’s support in the “new and challenging phase”.
The DNA started its operations from Mumbai in July 2005.
