The Hindu: with core values and modernizing apace, making news the family business

Bakul Srimany

Introduction
The Hindu, English-language daily newspaper published in Chennai (Madras), generally
regarded as one of India’s most influential dailies. The Hindu is distinguished for its
comprehensive coverage of national and international political news and for its emphasis on
accuracy and balanced coverage. Although it is published in a provincial capital, The Hindu’s
reportage and editorials are read carefully and taken seriously in the national capital. The
newspaper’s parent company, Hindu Group Publications, also publishes The Hindu Business
Line, a daily business paper, and popular magazines such as Frontline and Sportstar. At the
beginning of the 21st century, its daily circulation exceeded 900,000. It is the second most
circulated English-language newspaper in India, after The Times of India. The newspaper and
other publications in The Hindu Group are owned by a family-held company, Kasturi and
Sons Ltd. The newspaper employed over 1,600 workers and annual turnover reached almost
$200 million according to data from 2010. Most of the revenue comes from advertising and
subscription. The past decade of economic liberalisation has been a time of accelerated
growth for Indian newspapers, with a sea change taking place in their production,
distribution, marketing, profitability, and overall operations. The Hindu's circulation virtually
doubled between 1993 and 2003. The Hindu became, in 1995, the first Indian newspaper to
offer an online edition. It is the oldest surviving major newspaper of Indian nationalism, by
which we mean the great socio-political movement that won freedom for India from colonial
bondage and helped consolidate the gains of independence in every sphere of national life. As
of March 2018, The Hindu is published from 21 locations across 11 states: Bengaluru,
Chennai, Hyderabad, Thiruvananthapuram, Vijayawada, Kolkata, Mumbai, Coimbatore,
Madurai, Noida, Visakhapatnam, Kochi, Mangaluru, Tiruchirappalli, Hubballi, Mohali,
Allahabad, Kozhikode, Lucknow, Tirupati, Cuttack and Patna.

Early years of The Hindu

Throughout the first quarter century of its history, fired by the ideals and public spiritedness
of its six young founders and reflecting the times, the newspaper was run primarily as a
public mission, without too much concern for commercial considerations. The Hindu was
founded on September 20, 1878, by six young nationalists led by radical social reformer and
school teacher G. Subramania Aiyer of Tiruvaiyyar near Thanjavur district of Tamilnadu. The
others were: his friend, a lecturer at Pachaiyappa's College M. Veeraraghavachariar of
Chengalpattu and law students T.T. Rangachariar, P.V. Rangachariar, D. Kesava Rao Pant and
N. Subba Rau Pantulu. The "Triplicane Six" ( All were members of the Triplicane Literary
Society, which like similar clubs and societies had been formed to educate and enlighten the
masses and mould public opinion against draconian measures of the time.), as they were
called, were angry that the Anglo-Indian press - newspapers owned and edited by the British -
had panned the appointment of T. Muthuswami Aiyer, as a Judge of the Madras High Court,
the first Indian to be so appointed. They borrowed one rupee and twelve annas and started
The Hindu as a weekly - published every Wednesday evening an eight-page paper, each a
quarter of today's page size, for four annas, to counter the campaign against Muthuswami
Aiyer's appointment. Subramania Iyer became the first editor and Veera Raghavacharya, the
first managing director of the newspaper.
In that first issue `The Triplicane Six' justified their venture thus: "The Press does not only
give expression to public opinion, but also modifies and moulds it according to
circumstances. It is this want that we have made bold to attempt to supply. The principles that
we propose to be guided by are simply those of fairness and justice. It will always be our aim
to promote harmony and union among our fellow countrymen and to interpret correctly the
feelings of the natives and to create mutual confidence between the governed and the
governors... " In the first editorial titled "Ourselves", the founders flagged two guiding
principles: fairness and justice. After one hundred and twenty-five years later also, its first
editorial continues to shape the paper's role in creating, regulating and moulding public
opinion. Not surprisingly for the times, no radical vision of freedom for India informed this
leader. But the remarkable thing about the editorial was the clear-sighted and bold
formulation of a role for a weekly starting with a print-run of 80 copies - as the creator,
regulator and moulder of public opinion. The Hindu asked the educated section of "the native
community" to fill up "as far as it is possible and practicable the gap separating the governors
from the governed." These were to prove crucial for its survival and development over the
long term.
During its initial years, the paper was printed at Srinidhi Press, Mint Street, Black Town,
Madras. After a month with the Srinidhi Press, the newspaper had its printing shifted to the
Scottish Press, also in `Black Town'. Soon the students, who became lawyers, parted ways
with Subramania Aiyer and ūVeeraraghavachariar, the Managing Editor. It was during this
explosive period that The Hindu moved to Mylapore and `The Hindu Press', established by
the paper's friend Ragoonada Row, where it expected greater priority in production. However,
within a month it found that what the proprietors were planning, a tri-weekly paper to keep
on top of the news and provide "a timely discussion of topics of current interest," would be
impossible to produce here.
It now moved to the Empress of India Press, where, from October 1, 1883, it became a tri-
weekly, but maintaining the same size, published on Monday, Wednesday and Friday . Within
three months of coming out every Monday, Wednesday and Friday evening, the owners felt
that the demand for the paper could only be met if they had their own press. They therefore
rented new premises, had Rajoo Pathur of Arulanandam & Sons equip it to meet their
requirements, and moved to 100, Mount Road on December 3, 1883. It became an evening
daily from April 1, 1889. The new place of business - established on borrowed capital when
public subscriptions were not forthcoming - was called `The National Press'. A new era in
India journalism was to begin. The building itself became The Hindu's in 1892, after the
Maharaja of Vizianagaram, Ananda Gajapathi Raja, generously gave The National Press a
loan both for the building and to carry out needed expansion.
Later, the two former school teachers had differences over the issue of social reform. Writing
in the special supplement issued along with The Hindu of September 13 to mark the 125th
anniversary, Historian S. Muthiah said: "The Hindu was Subramania Aiyer's vehicle for
social reform crusades. In a conservative society, it was inevitable that such zeal would
encounter a hostile backlash. Veeraraghavachariar, in charge of the business side, found the
repercussions squeezing the paper's finances. There was an inevitable parting of ways and the
partnership was dissolved in October 1898. Within days of the break, Subramania Aiyer took
over full-time the editorship of the Swadesamitran while Veeraraghavachariar took over the
entire business of the struggling newspaper."
In the 1900s, The Hindu's circulation dropped to 800 copies and Veeraraghavachariar decided
to sell it. S. Kasturiranga Iyengar, The Hindu's legal adviser, "a politically ambitious lawyer",
bought it. On April 1, 1905, he, along with two partners, took over the paper for a
consideration of Rs.75,000, and by July 1905 had independent charge of it. Kasturiranga
Iyengar could be termed The Hindu's first moderniser. Between 1921 and 1923 he installed
the first rotary printing press in south India and modern linotype composing machines, setting
the trend the paper follows to this day of being first with modern newspaper technology in
India. While S. Rangaswami wielded a pen that scorched paper, K. Srinivasan, Kasturi Ranga
Iyengar son, attended to management, playing more and more of a major role as his father's
health deteriorated in the early 1920s. Together they introduced numerous entertaining
features to brighten up the paper. In the mid-1920s, The Hindu, introduced cartoons, a full
picture page, a weekly woman's page, short stories and humorous skits aplenty - and the
paper included among its exclusive contributors Jawaharlal Nehru, Krishna Menon, Subhas
Chandra Bose and a galaxy of writers from abroad introduced through syndicated services. It
published wedding photographs, pictures of arrivals and departures (this exposure becoming
a status symbol), of social functions and entertainments, of successful persons and new
appointees. It was a paper as game to publish a whole page of pictures of Governor Lord
Goschen's daughter's Madras wedding as it was to publish pictures of the ex-Maharaja of
Indore and his American fiancee as well as columns of reports on their international romance.
He teamed up with Rangaswami and his brother to turn the paper into a financial success.
Together they remodelled the methods of production and circulation. A battery of Linotype
machines and a new high-speed rotary prints were in place by 1921. Space for `Commercial',
`Financial' and `Sporting' features was increased. And so were wages for all - which were
supplemented by a Provident Fund. An even faster rotary machine capable of printing 30,000
copies an hour was ordered. When Kasturi Ranga Iyengar died in December 1923, the paper
had stabilised with a circulation of 17,000 copies and considerable advertising revenue. It
was a natural and successful partnership that lasted until Rangaswami's untimely death in
1926 - his memory now commemorated only in the trophy for national supremacy in the
game he loved, hockey, the Rangaswamy Cup presented by The Hindu in 1957. The Hindu's
use of its own aircraft for distribution of the newspaper, was a first for the industry in India.
In 1929, when the first Indian air mail plane landed at Karachi, it brought The Hindu's first
"air mail stories" from London - eleven of them. Over the years, Srinivasan, who was
fascinated by air transport, was to strengthen the paper's commitment to using aircraft
directly in the news business.
From November 11, 1940, it became a morning paper, dictated by the coverage demands of
the Second World War and the difference in time zones. In the article `The Hindu experience'
in the supplement, S. Muthiah tells how the newspaper achieved this in a riveting account of
the paper's campaign for widow remarriage, its support to the freedom struggle, its blowing
the lid on Bofors, and its stand on the Sri Lankan Tamil problem, besides other issues. The
Hindu scored an exclusive on the Japanese surrender in the Second World War when most of
the country's morning dailies missed it. A stenographer posted to monitor radio bulletins
every night during the War years listened to the BBC news for a last check at 4-30 a.m., when
the printing of the first edition was under way. He heard the news of the Japanese surrender
and the paper headlined it, while the others missed it.
In 1938, The Hindu became the first newspaper in the country to have a teleprinter
connection from the Central Telegraph Office to receive the news. By 1949, when greater use
of teleprinter lines became feasible, The Hindu was the first paper to make use of
Government's offer, setting up its own link with Bombay and, then, with Delhi. Dedicated
links to other cities were added later.
The Hindu has won national and international acclaim. In 1965, The Times, London, chose
The Hindu among the world's ten best newspapers, when it ran a series of articles on the
newspapers of the world. In 1968, it received the World Press Achievement Award of the
American Newspaper Publishers' Association Foundation.

The Editorial transitions and changing policies of The Hindu

In the late 1985s, when its ownership passed into the hands of the family's younger members,
a change in political leaning was observed. Joint managing director N. Murali said in July
2003, "It is true that our readers have been complaining that some of our reports are partial
and lack objectivity. But it also depends on reader beliefs." N. Ram was appointed on 27 June
2003 as its editor-in-chief with a mandate to "improve the structures and other mechanisms to
uphold and strengthen quality and objectivity in news reports and opinion pieces", authorised
to "restructure the editorial framework and functions in line with the competitive
environment". On 3rd and 23rd September 2003, the reader's letters column carried responses
from readers saying the editorial was biased. An editorial in August 2003 observed that the
newspaper was affected by the 'editorialising as news reporting' virus, and expressed a
determination to buck the trend, restore the professionally sound lines of demarcation, and
strengthen objectivity and factuality in its coverage.
In 1987–88, The Hindu's coverage of the Bofors arms deal scandal, a series of document-
backed exclusives, set the terms of the national political discourse on this subject. The Bofors
scandal broke in April 1987 with Swedish Radio alleging that bribes had been paid to top
Indian political leaders, officials and Army officers in return for the Swedish arms
manufacturing company winning a hefty contract with the Government of India for the
purchase of 155 mm howitzers. During a six-month period, the newspaper published scores
of copies of original papers that documented the secret payments, amounting to $50 million,
into Swiss bank accounts, the agreements behind the payments, communications relating to
the payments and the crisis response, and other material. The investigation was led by a part-
time correspondent of The Hindu, Chitra Subramaniam, reporting from Geneva, and was
supported by Ram in Chennai. In 1991, Deputy Editor N. Ravi, Ram's younger brother,
replaced G. Kasturi as editor. Nirmala Lakshman, Kasturi Srinivasan's granddaughter and the
first woman in the company to hold an editorial or managerial role, became Joint Editor of
The Hindu and her sister, Malini Parthasarathy, Executive Editor.
In 2003, the Jayalalitha government of the state of Tamil Nadu, of which Chennai is the
capital, filed cases against The Hindu for breach of privilege of the state legislative body. The
move was perceived as a government's assault on freedom of the press. The paper garnered
support from the journalistic community.
On 21st July 2011, Siddharth Varadarajan, the national bureau chief of The Hindu, was
appointed editor of The Hindu (made effective from 30th July 2011), a move that triggered the
resignations of three members of the family from their senior editorial positions: N. Ravi
resigned as editor, Malini Parthasarathy as executive editor and Nirmala Lakshman as the
joint editor. A fourth member of the family, N. Murali, announced his retirement on attaining
the age of 65 on 11th August 2011. They remain on the board of directors. Varadarajan was
named by N. Ram, the editor-in-chief to succeed him.
On 2nd April 2013 The Hindu started "The Hindu in School" with S. Shivakumar as editor.
This is a new edition for young readers, to be distributed through schools as part of The
Hindu's "Newspaper in Education" programme. It covers the day's important news
developments, features, sports, and regional news. On 16 th September 2013, The Hindu
group launched its Tamil edition with K. Ashokan as editor.
On 21st October 2013, changes have been made in Editorial as well as business of The
Hindu. N.Ravi has taken over as Editor-in-chief of The Hindu and Malini Parthasarathy as
Editor of The Hindu. In a consequence, Siddarth Varadarajan has submitted his resignation.
N. Ram has become Chairman of Kasturi & Sons Limited and Publisher of The Hindu and
Group publications as well as N. Murali, Co-Chairman of the company.
During the 2015 South Indian floods, for the first time since its founding in 1878, the
newspaper did not publish a print edition in Chennai market on 2 nd December, as workers
were unable to reach the press building. On 5 th January 2016, Malini Parthasarathy, the
Editor of the newspaper, resigned with immediate effect. It was reported by the media that
she resigned her post, citing "general dissatisfaction" with her performance. However, she
continues to be a Whole-time Director of Kasturi & Sons Ltd.
Over the course of its history the Kasturi Ranga Iyengar family has usually run The Hindu
through the presence of family in editorial and business operations as well as on the Board.
As of 2010, there are 12 directors in the board of Kasturi & Sons.
Chronological order of Managing directors and their working periods
 M. Veeraraghavachariar (1878–1904)
 S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar (1904–1923)
 K. Srinivasan (1923–1959)
 G. Narasimhan (1959–1977)
 N. Ram (1977–2011)
 K. Balaji (2011–2012)
 Rajiv C Lochan (2013- 2019)
 L V Navaneeth(2019 - present)

Chronological order of editors and their working periods

  G. Subramania Iyer (1878–1898)
 C. Karunakara Menon (1898–1905)
 Kasturi Ranga Iyengar (1905–1923)
 S. Rangaswami Iyengar (1923–1926)
 K. Srinivasan (1926–1928)
 Rangaswami Iyengar (1928–1934)
 K. Srinivasan (1934–1959)
 S. Parthasarathy (1959–1965)
 G. Kasturi (1965–1991)
 N. Ravi (1991–2003)
 N. Ram (2003–2012)
 Siddharth Varadarajan (2012–2013)
 N. Ravi (2013–2015)
 Malini Parthasarathy (2015–2016)
 Mukund Padmanabhan (2016–2019)
 Suresh Nambath (2019–present)

Expanding footprint and N. Ram

Narasimhan Ram also known as N. Ram is an Indian journalist and prominent member of the
Kasturi family that controls The Hindu Group of publications. Ram was the Managing-
Director of The Hindu since 1977 and its Editor-in-Chief since 27 th June 2003 until 18th
January 2012. Ram also headed the other publications of The Hindu Group such as Frontline,
The Hindu Business Line and Sportstar. Subsequent to changes in the Editorial & Business of
'The Hindu' on 21st October 2013, N.Ram has become Chairman of Kasturi & Sons Limited
and Publisher of 'The Hindu. He has been awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of
India and Sri Lanka Ratna by the Government of Sri Lanka ( The Highest national honour
conferred by Sri Lanka on non – nationals ).
Ram was born on 4 May 1945 in Madras, British India. He was the eldest son of G.
Narasimhan who served as Managing-Director of The Hindu from 1959 to 1977. Ram is a
great-grandson of S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, the patriarch of the Kasturi family. Ram
graduated from Loyola College, Chennai, with a bachelor's degree in arts in 1964, received a
master's degree from Presidency College, Chennai, in 1966, and later an M.S. in comparative
journalism from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He actively
participated in the students politics. He was vice-president of the Students Federation of India
(SFI), which is politically linked to the Communist Party of India (Marxist), at the time of its
formation in 1970 in Thiruvananthapuram.
Beginning his career in The Hindu as an Associate Editor in 1977, Ram was made the
Washington Correspondent in 1980. His association with the news magazine Frontline dates
back to 1984, when the magazine was started. During his younger days, N.Ram also started a
journal called Radical Review, with his friends, P.Chidambaram and Prakash Karat. N Ram
has become famous as a journalist during his writings in exposing Bofors Scandal during the
reign of former Prime Minister of India Rajiv Gandhi. Prior to his position as the editor-in-
chief of the Hindu daily, Ram had served as the Editor of Frontline magazine and Sportstar
between 1991 and 2003. Towards the end of a bitter family feud, Ram stepped down as
Editor-in-chief and Publisher of The Hindu group on 19th January 2012.
Ram's contribution to journalism has been recognised by a number of awards. These include
the Asian Investigative Journalist of the Year Award, conferred by the Press Foundation of
Asia in the year 1990. N. Ram has been chosen for the prestigious Raja Ram Mohan Roy
Award, presented by the Press Council of India (PCI), for his outstanding contribution
towards journalism, the Council presented the award on 16th November, 2018 on the
occasion of the National Press Day.

Conclusion
The saga of the development of the "business" of The Hindu over 125 years of its existence
has been one of having to continuously strike a fine balance between two seemingly
competing considerations — the public mission or larger societal purpose encompassing the
credible information providing, educational, opinion building and watchdog role of The
Hindu, the newspaper, versus the commerce part of conducting its operations as a business.
Now, The newspaper has foreign bureaus in eleven locations – Islamabad, Colombo, Dhaka,
Kathmandu, Beijing, Moscow, Paris, Dubai, Washington, D.C., London, and most recently
Addis Ababa. It is printed in 11 centres and boasts a circulation of 9.33 lakh copies. Kasturi
& Sons Ltd. is a Rs.400-crore company.
The Hindu was the first newspaper in India to have a website, launched in 1995. On 15 th
August 2009, the 130-year-old newspaper launched the beta version of its redesigned website
at beta.thehindu.com. This was the first redesign of its website since its launch. On 24th June
2010 the beta version of the website went fully live at www.thehindu.com.
In 1965, The Times listed The Hindu as one of the world's ten best newspapers.
In 1968, the American Newspaper Publishers' Association awarded The Hindu its World
Press Achievement Award.