Firstpost.com was born due to the global financial crisis of 2008, Raghav Behl, founder of the Network18 group said.
Speaking at the annual FICCI Frames conference, Behl said his group was preparing to launch a newspaper in 2008 when the global financial crisis struck.
“Then we thought, why go into an old medium…but we wanted to be in textual journalism,” Behl said.
Firstpost.com is arguably India’s most successful exclusive new media platform and is headed by noted journalist R Jagannathan.
Behl owns the Network18 group, which operates the CNBC franchise in India.
Behl, who recently gave control over his group to one of India’s most powerful men, said he was not worried that the media sector would be cornered by one or two groups.
“The core is intact, healthy, and the core is doing a lot of good,” he said.
Dismissing such speculation as “absolutely irrelevant talk” that was being used for “self serving purposes”, he said the plurality of the Indian media sector would ensure that diversity would remain.