Prime Minister Vajpayee was in Chennai last Saturday (Sep 13) for the inauguration of the 125th anniversary celebrations of The Hindu. Saturday's edition of The Hindu had some interesting extras in additional to the regular daily fare:
- The front page was a replica of the front page of The Hindu's edition dated November 16, 1883. (The earliest surviving edition dates to June 21, 1881. a replica of which figures in the special supplement). The 1881 edition had only content on the front page, but the 1883 edition had only ads on the front page!
- Superimposed on the front page was also the text of the Editorial, titled Ourselves, that appeared in the inaugural edition of The Hindu in 1878, when it was originally founded as a weekly.
- The inside front page had a snapshot of the front page of the The Hindu's Centenary edition dated September 05, 1978.
- There was a special supplement with an article tracing The Hindu's story from its origins in 1878 up until now. along with other articles tracing The Hindu's editorial positions, the growth of its business and technology, its coverage of the arts, economic issues and sports, including Jack Fingleton's report for The Hindu on the first Tied Test Match.
To quote from the Editorial, titled Ourselves, that appeared in its inaugural issue in 1878,
... one of the greatest evils that keep behind the advancement of our people is the absence of an organised public opinion. We do not share in the opinion that the educated Hindus are without convictions. On the other hand, it is not so much the alleged born ways of thinking and speaking imputed to the educated Hindus that has occasioned the absence of public opinion as the want of a well conducted native press to which the public may look to regulate their opinion. The Press does not only give expression to public opinion, but also modify and mould it according to circumstances. It is this want that we have made bold to attempt to supply. It is the duty of that section of the native community that claims to be educated to fill up as far as it is possible and practicable the gap separating the governors from the governed. We feel this and we attempt to do justice to our feeling.
The objective in 1878 was to express and mould public opinion guided by the principles of fairness and justice, and the best means to do so then was through publishing a print newspaper. No other medium was in existence then. I could not find the fundamental objective of The Hindu (as an organisation, not the newspaper) in today's world articulated anywhere. The editorial in the special supplement on Saturday only described the functions that a serious newspaper like The Hindu can perform today to benefit society as the credible-informational, the critical-investigative-`watchdog', the educational, and the agenda-building functions. The editorial also proclaimed a set of five principles to guide The Hindu in the future: truth telling; freedom and independence; justice; humaneness; and contributing to the social good.
All this presumes that The Hindu will be solely in the newspaper business. I think The Hindu needs to ask itself if it is in the newspaper business or in the business of informing, educating and moulding public opinion through the most effective and appropriate media available. The often quoted example of the US railroad companies in the early part of the century missing the bus (pun unintended) by seeing themselves as being in the railroad business and not the transportation business comes to mind.
Some of the challenges ahead for The Hindu in the newspaper business (as mentioned by their Joint Managing Director N. Murali in the special supplement) are:
- Size of audience: Newspapers are no more the sole purveryor of news/analysis/opinion. Other media like TV and the Internet are strong players too with a higher reach than print media and only likely to get higher. TV in particular can reach the illiterate population too.
- Share of Ad Revenues: Print media's share of the advertising pie has dropped from 63% to 52.7% during 1993-2003 out of a 2003 pie of 9,500 crores. TV has shot up to 38.7% as of 2003 and will continue to increase.
- Over dependence on advertising revenues: 80% of the revenues of a large English daily like The Hindu come from advertising and so the revenues are severely affected in an economic downturn with advertising drying up. Circulation revenues are low due to severe price competition and can't be increased.
- Tomorrow's readership: The newspaper habit amongst today's youngsters is dying. Tomorrow's readership is not assured.
In addition to these, a few other issues need to considered from an overall business standpoint. While The Hindu is their flagship in terms of both audience and revenues and is very profitable,the group's other businesses also need to be thought through. In particular,
- How profitable are Frontline, Business Line and The Sportstar? How much effort is going into making them (more) profitable?
- What is their online business model? How and when will it become profitable?
- Not having forayed into the vernacular press in the past, that opportunity is pretty much closed now, with too many entrenched players. With the majority of the populace literate, but not knowing English, how does The Hindu as an organisation hope to influence the thoughts and opinion of that segment?
- Has The Hindu lost out by not having diversified into TV in the nineties?
- Is The Hindu losing out to local neighbourhood newspapers (especially in Chennai) by not paying enough attention to local community issues?
There has been a change of editorial guard at The Hindu with N. Ram becoming the Editor-in-Chief a few months ago. It will be interesting to see if there are any new developments on the business focus as well.
I have been a reader of The Hindu for over 25 years now and hope to be one for another 25 years.
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