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The battle for readership is going vernacular. One of the oldest media houses in the country, Kasturi & Sons, the publishers of The Hindu has become the latest company to endorse this reality with its plans to launch a Tamil newspaper before September.
For a group that has ignored the regional market for long -this will be the company's first non-English publication since its inception in 1878 - the decision to start a Tamil newspaper is a recognition of the changing landscape in the print media in the country. Like all other players in the industry, Kasturi & Sons, too, is moving to frontiers where the advertisers are. The language papers offer a huge opportunity, say industry experts, as advertisers are now turning their attention to this segment which has readers in Tier II and III cities with a growing disposable income.
According to a Deloitte report on the media and entrainment market in South India, for Tamil dailies, 75 per cent of the revenue comes from advertisements and only 25 per cent from circulation. "Vernaculars have done remarkably well and there is only one English newspaper among the top ten dailies in India; the rest are regional. There is a huge demand for local news and people are looking forward for that in local languages," says the study.
Tamil Nadu accounted for 26 per cent of the overall regional print industry, estimated at Rs 2,970 crore in 2011-12. Sandip Biswas, director, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India, says the circulation ratio in Tamil Nadu is 75:100 (for every 75 English newspapers, 100 Tamil newspaper are sold). As of now, the big players in this segment are Daily Thanthi, Dinakaran (owned by the Sun group) Dinamalar and Dinamani.
Industry observers say Kasturi & Sons' decision to start a Tamil paper also stems from the recent aggressive stance taken by Bennett, Coleman & Co, the publisher of The Times of India, in the regional market. Kasturi & Sons would not have liked to lose the first-mover advantage on its home turf.
N Ram, director of Kasturi & Sons and former editor-in-chief of The Hindu, has said that there is a huge opportunity in language newspapers, which to a large extent is untapped, especially in Tamil.
But will the company be able to make an impact with its content? The group has roped in industry veteran K Asokan as the editor for the yet- to-be-named newspaper. The company had initially decided to call it Kamadhenu, but it is now debating using its trademak "The Hindu" brand itself for its regional publication as well.
Apart from Asokan, a team of journalists, who have been groomed in the Tamil style of reporting, has also been hired. The group is targeting a subscription of 300,000 for the daily to start with. Kasturi & Sons, known for its reliable and authentic publications, will apply the same standards of journalism as its English dailies for its Tamil daily as well. However, at the same time, Ram says, he will take into account the peculiarities of a regional paper. For instance, local language papers offer a greater play to education and entertainment-related news.
N Murali, one of the directors and former managing director of The Hindu, says,"It is a gamble worth taking at this point."
Print media is at the crossroads in the country. While English newspapers are reporting stagnation or nominal growth, language newspapers are growing at a faster clip riding on the increasing purchasing power in smaller towns, which in turn is attracting advertisers. "Initially we were also sceptical. But looking at the trend in the last two years both in readership and revenue, launching a Tamil newspaper was inevitable," he says.
Murali believes the new newspaper can use the same readership base as the The Hindu.
However, analysts have a different view. An industry expert, who has been tracking the sector for over three decades, says addressing the existing readership base with a new product may not work, especially because The Hindu is taken as serious-reading, whereas vernacular papers are mostly picked up for leisure- reading. But many others believe the two can co-exist in the same household.
Among the challenges for the new venture, the foremost could come in the way of logistics support. The top three Tamil dailies have 12 printing centres each, compared to just four of Kasturi & Sons. Finding the right manpower would be a problem too. As regional papers require more local content, the company may have to create a huge network of reporters.
An industry representative says one of the top three Tamil newspapers has around 1,500 people who are not on its rolls but they supply news on a freelance basis.
The company may find it hard to create a niche for its paper in a market that is already quite mature. Experts say the market does not have room for any new player and Kasturi & Sons will have to dislodge existing players to create space for itself. Industry observers says the company may try to get into the space occupied by Dinamalar and Dinamani (owned by the New Indian Express group).
Kasturi & Sons will also have to reorient itself to provide entertainment news which is not its forte, says Murali.
The Hindu was started as a weekly publication in 1878 by six young nationalists led by a radical social reformer and school teacher, G Subramania Aiyer. The youngsters, who were in their 20s, belonged to a society called The Triplicane Literary Society, which was an important forum for Indians in the pre-Independence era to discuss current affairs.
The weekly publication grew to become a tri-weekly in 1883, an evening daily in 1889 and a morning paper in 1940. In 1905, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, bought The Hindu and turned it into a public limited company in 1959. What started as a modest operation with 80 printed copies in 1878 grew to become an industry leader with a reputation for editorial and technical excellence. According to the latest audit bureau of circulation figures, 1.55 million copies of The Hindu were sold daily across the country between July and December 2012.
With the general elections round the corner, the time may be just right for the new Tamil newspaper to make an impression. The Kasturi & Sons management has indicated that its newspaper would be among the Tamil dailies when the euphoria surrounding the elections intensifies. Surely, the content it could provide during this period of guess-works, calculations and judgement call could make all the difference between its success and failure.
