Imphal, November 22: India has been chosen as the host country for the 62nd World Newspaper Congress, 16th World Editors Forum and Info Services Expo in 2009, the World Association of Newspapers announced today.

The global summit meetings of the world's press will be held March 22-25, 2009 in Hyderabad and will be hosted by the Indian Newspaper Society (INS).

India has than 2000 daily newspapers in 100 languages with a combined circulation of 88 million.

The choice of Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh and India's fifth largest city, was made by the Board of the World Association of Newspapers during its meeting Tuesday in Vienna, Austria.

The 2008 events, scheduled for June 1-4, 2008, will be held in G�teborg, Sweden (hptt//www.

wansweden2008.com ).

"India is probably the most exciting newspaper market in the world at the moment," said Timothy Balding, CEO of the Paris-based WAN, which organises the events.

"There is tremendous growth, change and innovation, both in print and digitally.

Our choice of India also reflects our admiration for this huge country's respect for a free press as a pillar of democracy".

WEF Director, Bertrand Pecquerie, told Newswatch, "The newspaper industry is booming in India and what is interesting is that new media developments are complementary to print developments.

The second lesson for editors from around the world: the new titles and new online services in regional languages are not only in English and Hindi.

"Last point: I'm also very admirative about metro coverage in Indian newspapers: there is a specific knowledge on how to cover news from urban areas.

And I consider that the Indian press is a model for press freedom in South Asia when you compare it to what is happening in Pakistan today, but also in Sri Lanka or Bangladesh".

Pecquerie said, "But I think there are also problems in India about investigative journalism, corruption and often the lack of a clear division between editorial pages and advertising.

Here Indian newsrooms must be more proactive".

At present WAN has 52 Indian members out of around 950; WEF, on the other hand, has 18 Indian members out of around 350.With a population of more than 4 million, Hyderabad, located on the Deccan plateau in southern India, is a cosmopolitan city now vying to become India's Silicon Valley.

It has a blend of rich cultures and a renowned cuisine.

It is a centre for the pearl trade.

The Paris-based WAN, the global organisation for the newspaper industry represents 18,000 newspapers; its membership includes 76 national newspaper associations, newspaper companies and individual newspaper executives in 102 countries, 12 news agencies and 10 regional and worldwide press groups.

For more details, World Editors Forum can be contacted on its website: http://www.worldeditorsforum.org or its director Bertrand Pecquerie on [[email protected]] .

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