Machine-made paper was first manufactured in India in 1812. There were 15 mills with a total production of lakh tonnes. With rising population and broadening of education, the demand for paper has been escalating since. Owing to very narrow forest resources, wood pulp is in a shortage. Therefore, bamboo, sabai grass and sugarcane bagasse are being used more and more. Waste paper and rags are also recycled as raw materials. By 1997-98 there were 380 mills. From these, 28 were large ones and the rest were small units of 33,000 tonnes each. In 1997-98, production of paper and paper board had surpassed the 4 million tonne mark. The country has to meet 10% of the demand through imports.

The paper utilised for newspapers is called newsprint. Its requirement is bound to grow noticeably. The Nepanagar Newsprint plant in Madtiya was set up to meet these aforementioned demands. Its capacity has been raised to 75,000 tonnes a year. West Bengal and Maharashtra are the leaping states in this industry. But plants have come up in other parts of the country also. The total newsprint production has now reached well over 400,000 tonnes. However, imports of approximately 500,000 tonnes are still obligatory.