All Mayang Imphal Newspaper Hawkers Union has appealed to all media houses to refrain from uploading PDF files of the newspapers on social media like WhatsApp and Facebook before the papers are delivered.
A release said, the union had a meeting of all the hawkers of Imphal West to discuss the issues faced by the hawkers on Sunday at Mayang Imphal Durga Puja Mandop. A Mani Singh took part as the president of the meeting, it stated.
Uploading of PDF files before the delivery of papers has caused a reduction of newspaper subscribers day by day which in turn, has given many hardships to the hawkers, it added.
It further asked the media houses to make a system where downloading of PDF files from their websites is allowed only to those related to the press.
Hawkers’ organisations have appealed to the press houses to take up actions accordingly by May 30. If they failed to do so, decision has been made by the attendees of the meeting to halt the newspaper distribution from June 1, it added.
Thoubal District Hawker Association also stated that they are facing issues while collecting bills as the number of pages have decreased due to lock down. Further, they appealed to the media houses to give a statement concerning this issue.
Meanwhile, Kakching Hawker Association has cautioned that the hawkers will not distribute the newspapers of the media firms which do not pay heed to their requests, it said.