Thiruvananthapuram, Dec 14 (IANS) The first Malayalam portal from Kerala, malayalam.webduniya.com, has decided to stop operations amid rising concerns of economic crisis spreading into the media industry in the country. The portal’s editor T. Sasimohan confirmed the closure decision, saying the company’s chief operating officer and president Pankaj Jain told him last week that the Kerala operations were closing down.

“It came as a surprise and I was asked to convey the decision to the other staff members. Yesterday (Saturday) afternoon we got a mail asking the nine staff including me to join the Chennai office on Jan 1 (2009). The Chennai office is now doing the content job what we were doing till now,” Sasimohan told IANS.

When contacted over phone, however, the Indore-based Jain ruled out rumours that the company was closing the Malayalam portal due to economic crisis.

“We want to give more to our staff in Kerala,” he said.

“We have asked the people in the Kerala office to come down to Chennai. Maybe we will have a few people who can operate from their homes in Kerala,” Jain added.

The portal, initially known as weblokam.com, started its operations in November 2000 to become the first Malayalam portal operating from the state. The name was changed to malayalam.webduniya.com last June.