RAMYA KRISHNAMURTHY writes from Bangalore: Deccan Chronicle, the Hyderabad-based group that is listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange, has just launched its Bangalore edition. Hoardings like these that greeted Bangaloreans on the first day of publication, 26 May 2008, raise fundamental questions about how a bottomline-driven media (pun unintended) views its role in society and the kind of equations it seeks to build with readers it intends to serve.
Like, are well-sculpted “bare bodies” the only way of getting “young minds” interested in reading newspapers? Like, are male “young minds” so devoid of imagination as our media heads seem to think? Like, is there any proof that “young minds” have a problem with serious, meaningful content? Like, is this just a Bangalore/IT/BPO phenomenon? Like, are “middle-aged minds” and “old minds”—not to speak of “female minds”—totally out of the pale of our newspaper proprietors and managers?
Since the paper is landing at our doorsteps free of cost, maybe we shouldn’t look a gift-ass in the mouth. But, pray, what is this gorgeous young lady doing sitting like that?
ps: “young minds” might like to note, as my husband did, that the bird at the top left-hand corner of the hoarding is a crow.
Photograph: Prashant Krishnamurthy
Also read: The ads say it’s going to be smrtr and smplr. Bttr?
Neena Gopal to edit Deccan Chronicle, Bangalore
Forget invitation price, try a new paper for free!
Cross-posted on sans serif
churumuri 
I think the tts nd ss market is cornered by Times of India.
I get my news from the all knowing TV.
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The deccan chronicle was delivered as a free sample in Jaynagar area today. On the cover they have some sensational news like giving a new twist to the BPO employee Prathibha Murder case. I guess another yellow rag. I am not going for it. I would rather read Hustler and Playboy and our own Rathi Vignana, Surathi and Chakori if I needed ‘ttss nd ss’.
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But, But I thought protecting our culture was an impasse. A concern shared by dinosaurs on the verge of extinction. The new generation X drummed by retards like Sagarika Ghosh, Bhakra Dutt aim to reduce this disease by making us more tolerant to nudity. Hmm, the same nudity that had killed our Gods and Godess at the hands of “MF” Hussain.
Where are the secularists?
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It is intriguing to note that the paper is edited by a fiery woman editor. Its resident editors in Chennai and Bangalore are also women. They must have lapped up the ad or feigned ignorance.
These days, the criteria for becoming editors are different. As I have once said, being somewhere near someone who is about to die or killed ALSO seems to be a qualification to become an editor.
After all, editors of calbre are becoming an endangered species, thanks to crass commercialisation of newspapers. We shall grin and bear it.
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Get over your silly notions about the mind being superior to the body and the latter having to be hidden, punished, or otherwise defamed, especially when we are talking about women. Body and mind are one. If not so, ugly minds are far more dangerous.
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I think Bangalore Times and Deccan Chronicle with images as shown… would do well to sell as an evening newspaper…. delivered at your doors 8 pm …. no point delivering it at 6 in the morning.
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SumneNeeve,
I loved the MF spin to Hussain! great ingenuity!
DC is only employing cheerleader tabloids..so y complain?
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are well-sculpted “bare bodies” the only way of getting “young minds” interested in reading newspapers?
HAHAHA! It is not about sculpting, skill lies in photoshopping! :D
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I was reminded of the Indian express makeover last month (i think same day as the IPL started – when entertainment got a makeover :-), and the ads that announced it. One of it read ‘if i want sleaze, i will go online’, however, the supplement does enough to take care of sleaze for readers who are offline. When I was a kid, we subscribed for Navbharat Times (hindi daily from the Times group) and it rarely carried anything to catch the young minds. When Asian Age was launched it always carried one bold photograph (bold to the extent of topless women, in b&w of course) and that was considered outrageous. They had to stop that after a while, and I dont think any daily does that today. But considering the topic that Bangalore Times regularly carries articles on (Sex and stress, teens losing virginity at 16, one night stands, PDA,etc) its really difficult to decide which one is more in need of a morality check.
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deccan chronicle : rather than being called as addictive, it should be called the “seductive” newspaper. it is a cheap marketing strategy, however justified. i see the above gentlemen have some reasonable points for their justification but we need not forget the fact that, baring skin is not journalism and not the least u can get young minds hooked. they have been taken care of by debonair and playboy.
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Damn i saw this ad on cuningham road today and was thinking Deccan Chronicle needed a new market after the huge financial setback they suffered after the investing in IPL.
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Another tissue paper in the making! TOI-you’ve got competition!
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Incidentally, doesn’t the lady’s pose seem to suggest exactly that!? :)
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LOL! I am yet to find a sleazier newspaper.
About 10 years back, I remember DC’s Hyd edition(only Hyd then I guess) having a front page top left box news that read
“Today is world orgasm day”
And I was like, it is as important as a National day, why don’t we celebrate :D
May be this paper will be bought by teenagers on their way to school and would read it during intervals in school.
Sleaze sells, come what may.
oops I mean slz slls (DC lingo)
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tch tch.. nobody understands the significance of body copy these days…
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I am changing my name to “Pulikeshi the Lust.” More pictures. More nakedness. Nore clips of “nanga naach.”
No talk of the greatness of Indian culture. Even some of our judges say that women invite danger by the way they clad themselves. Can you believe those old jurists with bald pates, shrunken skulls and skin, wearing dentures get their jollies by salivating at the pictures of naked women, or maybe even live women walking somewhere in their dimming sight?
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Media persons of yore used to say that today’s paper is tomorrow’s wrapper. The ad implies that the paper can be used as a covering material the moment you buy the daily from your vendor.
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