Riding on the growing frustration of the Indian electorate with its politicians, Indian newspapers are increasingly adopting the social action mode to connect with their readers. In view of the upcoming general elections in the country, the Times of India relaunched its Lead India campaign, while Lokmat newspaper launched "MyIndiaMyWay" campaign. Mid-day, Indian Express, Hindustan Times and DNA have similar ongoing campaigns since the 26/11 terrorists' attack in Mumbai.

Edipresse Asia has created it's Indian presence through a joint venture with Mediascope and the partners have announced that they will launch their first publication in lifestyle space by the end of 2009. Mediascope has largely been in the businesses of custom publishing and sole advertising concessionaires for international publishers in India.

Ogaan Publications, the Indian franchise of Elle and Elle Decor, has shut down two of its recently-launched lifestyle magazines - Brides Now and Beautiful People. Though no reason was given for their closure, it is evident that the presence of a very large number of publications in the lifestyle space and economic slump are making surival difficult for most publishers.

Hyderabad-based Ochre Media has put its three magazines on sale. The three magazines are: Asian Hospital and Healthcare Management, Pharma Focus Asia and Auto Focus Asia. The websites related to these quarterly magazines will also be part of the deal.

The Indian government has completely removed customs duty (import duty) on newsprint, glazed newsprint and light weight coated paper, used primarily by newspapers and magazines, in an effort to reduce the impact of the economic slowdown on print publishing companies in India.

Outlook magazines's publisher and company president Maheshwar Peri will launch his own magazine Career's 360 under the banner of his company Pathfinder Publishing Pvt Ltd. The marketing and distribution of the new magazine, scheduled for launch in the first week of April, will be managed by the Outlook group.

One of India's larger B2B publishing company, Infomedia, is in for more trouble - its international partner Reed Business Information is walking out of their JV named Reed Infomedia. The company's ownership recently changed from ICICI Ventures to Network18. The company's managing director Prakash Iyer has since then quit the company and various other senior executives are searching for better opportunities, while the new owners try to keep the company lean.

Amidst stories of magazines folding up, revenues going down and aggressive cost-cutting everywhere, India's two publishing companies have launched newer titles. India Today has launched Bazaar India, a licensed title from Harper's, in India. Cyber Media launched Technology Review in its own licensing relationship.

Ask any stock market pundit and he will say this is the right time to invest. In publishing, a publisher won't give such an advice because of the 'traumatic' phase that he himself is going through. While we at IMO have maintained that as publications continue to bleed more, the opportunity of buying out publications will only get "juicier". Another opportunity that can be bought into immediately is the online space - where most of the content consumers are already residing. Riding on the web 2.0 wave of many-to-many publishing, community websites promoted by existing publishers will be fruitful bets for the long-term.

At Chronosphere, we seek to build collaborative relationships with publishers of special-interest and B2B magazines, without adding to their current financial challenges.

- Bhupesh Trivedi
Feedback/Comments welcome at: publisher (at) chronosphere (dot) biz