KATHMANDU, July 18

Press Council Nepal has categorised seven national dailies, including The Himalayan Times, as ‘A+ Class National Daily’.

Press Council Nepal, a statutory body set up by the government to promote the standards of a free press and to advise the government on matters relating to the development of healthy and credible journalism in the country, classifies newspapers and magazines on the basis of their circulation and number of their publications.

It has developed a standard procedure and guidelines to evaluate newspapers and magazines for their classification. After making the final classification, a report is submitted to the Ministry of Information and Communications for approval.

Press Council Nepal, however, for the first time has started classifying newspapers and magazines as ‘A+ Class’.

According to the classification results of the fiscal year 2014-15 made public by yesterday, seven national dailies — Gorkhapatra, Kantipur, The Himalayan Times, Annapurna Post, The Rising Nepal, Nagarik and The Kathmandu Post — have been classified as ‘A+ Class’ newspapers.

Sixteen national dailies, including Himalaya Times, Rajdhani, Republica (English daily), Rastriya Dainik Patra and Naya Patrika, have been listed as ‘A Class’ newspapers.

As many as 875 newspapers and magazines of national, regional and local level had filed applications for the classification in 2014-15. Of them, 822 newspapers and magazines have been included in the classification while results of 53 have been withheld for various reasons.

Press Council Nepal said any newspaper or magazine dissatisfied with the results may file application, seeking a review within 15 days of publication of results.