Vincent D'souza

Vincent D'Souza is a well-known journalist and media entrepreneur based in Chennai. He is the editor and publisher of two very popular community newspapers, The Mylapore Times and The Arcot Road Times in the city. He is also the executive editor of the largest neighbourhood newspaper in Chennai, "The Adyar Times". The three newspapers have a combined circulation of over 85000 copies a week. [ [http://vincentsjottings.blogspot.com/ Vincent's Jottings ] ]

Career As Journalist

D'Souza began his career as a journalist in 1980 after completing his BS in physics from Chennai's Loyola College. He has reported for "The Week" magazine of the Malayala Manorama group, and was a stringer for BBC Radio. He covered the 1998 Coimbatore serial bomb blasts, and its aftermath for the Beeb. For a brief while D'Souza was also the editor of Indian Express (Madras) Friday supplement on cinema, art and entertainment.

Neighbourhood Papers

He currently edits three free English community newspapers in Chennai - "Adyar Times, Mylapore Times" and "Arcot Road Times". In 1999 he started the internet website KutcheriBuzz.com, focussed on south Indian classical music and dance. Along with the website, he also brings out a monthly 8-12 page "Kutcheribuzz" newsletter. During the fortnight long December Music Season in Chennai, "Kutcheribuzz" morphs into a single sheet eveninger, distributed for free outside concert halls. Over the last couple of years, Kutcheribuzz.com has added audio and video news reports of popular classical music and dance events such as the Tiruvaiyyaru Thyagaraja Aradhana, and the Chidambaram dance festival that takes place at the Nataraja Temple during Shivaratri.D'Souza's experiment with a free community newspaper in the erstwhile French enclave of Pondicherry was a short lived one. He pulled the shutter on the paper, "Pondicherry Times", in 2001.

He also promotes two other major events in Madras -the Mylapore Festival held in Mylapore on Pongal eve and the Madras Day celebrations held to celebrate the south Indian city. [ [http://www.mylaporefestival.com/ The Sundaram Finance Mylapore Festival 2008 ] ]

Besides fulfilling the unique communication needs of specific neighbourhoods, D'Souza's publications have been an excellent training ground for aspiring journalists. Unlike several other community papers, "Mylapore Times, Arcot Road Times" and "Adyar Times" are professionally run papers with reasonably good production standards. Despite being small publications, D'souza's papers have steadfastly tried to keep the wall between news and advertising intact.

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