Q. Amrita Bazar Patrika had not to face what Som Prakash, Bharat Mihir, Dacca Prakash and Samachar had to go through. What was the suffering of the latter group?
Answer: Repressions under Vernacular Press Act, 1878
Notes: Vernacular Press Act was introduced by Lord Lytton in 1878. The act stated that any magistrate or commissioner of police had the authority to call upon any printer or publisher of a newspaper to enter into a bond, undertaking not to print a certain kind of material, and could confiscate any printed material it deemed objectionable. The Vernacular Press Act, 1878 was a discriminatory Act which provided for legal proceedings against newspapers published in vernacular languages. To skip this discrimination, Amrita Bazar Patrika turned itself into an English newspaper overnight.