In Hyderabad

On one of my early days in Hyderabad, as I boarded a city transport bus and looked about for the conductor, I was surprised when a fat, round woman in a grey sari with a grey overcoat gruffly asked me to buy a ticket in Telugu using the English word for ticket. As I handed her the change and collected my ticket, I thought that I had met a rare species - a woman conductor (or shall we say conductress?).
But, soon I was to be proved wrong. On four consecutive bus rides spanning over three days, I met the so-assumed rare species, making it no more rarer than the male counterpart.

On a weekend in Secunderabad, I was again surprised when two middle-aged women in maroon saris, whistles in their mouth, worked as parking lot assistants on PG Road. One of them whistled hard as she helped a larger car squeeze into a parking slot.

The Media War Hits Chennai

It will probably be the battle of the year. It is something students of marketing shouldn't miss out. Yes, I'm talking of the impending launch of The Times Of India in Chennai. The Chennai edition of TOI will roll off the presses from April 14. And, already it has caused a flutter in the Chennai circles.
The TOI sells its paper for anywhere between a rupee and two on weekdays in the other metros. In contrast, The Hindu's Chennai edition sells at Rs 3.25 on weekdays and Rs. 4.50 on Sundays. TOI is pricing its Chennai edition at less than a rupee a day (It's Rs 170 for six months.).


TOI makes no bones that ads are the main source of its revenue. One of the first signs of The Hindu gearing up for TOI's competition in the ad market was when it carried it's first full cover-page on 29 February 2008. It was followed by another one on March 8. It is common for the other editions of the TOI to carry full cover-page ads every now and then. TOI frequently carries flap ads which cover half of the first page. (This is even more irritating that a full first-page ad because the flap keeps popping over and makes reading uncomfortable unless you throw off the page.) Now, this was the first sign the market leader The Hindu wanted to be in the good books of ad providers and did not want them to drift towards TOI.

Another sign was seen even before the full first page ads. This was on February 23 when Metro Plus on Saturdays was modified as a tabloid named Metro Plus WEEKEND. The first Metro Plus WEEKEND's cover-page had Shruti Haasan revealing her shoulder bone - a tamer version of TOI's city supplements. As my grandfather rued that it had nothing to read, I thought about TOI's weekend supplement called "Whats Hot?" brought out every Friday. Metro Plus WEEKEND is still higher in terms of content. After all, for The Hindu, old habits die hard!



March 27, Thursday saw a brand new supplement from The Hindu. This was NXg aimed at Generation Next, which The Hindu believed had not been given its due. It was aimed at the youth, like a TOI city supplement. It provided us details of Koena Mitra's Hollywood projects and Emma Watson's table tennis. But, it had a section on Books besides the usual music, movie, fashion rants, something which a TOI supplement does not carry. It may sound repetitive but old habits die hard! The Tuesday Book Review column (especially the Know Your English column) in The Hindu is still my favorite. And, I can say nothing about The Hindu Literary Review, published in black and white on the first Sunday of every month. It does not carry a single ad.

Even The Hindu Sunday Magazine carries some small quarter page ads only in the second-last and last pages. Sometimes, even that is not there. The Hindu Sunday Magazine provides well-researched articles on a variety of topics. In contrast, TOI's Sunday Supplement called Life! is printed on glossy paper and projects minor trends as the next big thing. It contains more ads than written material. I will provide an example of the absurd articles in Times Life! in my next update.

The Hindu Friday Review has no TOI counterpart. The concept of Indian culture is alien to the Old Lady of Boribunder. The Mount Road Mahavishnu, however, still takes pleasure in his cultural roots. I love the Friday Review for its pictures. They make you want to read the accompanying piece even if you've had no formal training in the arts.
(To be continued...)

MAD RA(ndom) (thought)S

In IIT, there are a lot more people from other parts of the country than there are from Madras. And, most of these people wouldn’t want to be here in Madras if it weren’t for the IIT.

For one, the weather is a big turn-off. Madras has three seasons – hot, hotter and hottest goes one popular comment. And, it’s quite true. Being in the rainshadow of the Ghats, Madras defies convention by being the only place in India not to benefit from the South-West monsoon. The North-East monsoon does oblige the city sometimes, only it’s too random. However, for the past couple of years, thanks to global warming which seems to be altering weather patterns around the world, Madras has been getting a fairly decent amount of rainfall. Thankfully, for now, the IIT M administration need not think of compressed semesters, at least in the near future. The North-East monsoon essentially operates on a trough of low pressure somewhere in the Bay of Bengal. Sometimes, if you are lucky, a depression develops there even in summer and the city gets some much-needed rain.

And of course, if we in the campus get only half as boiled as people outside, we must thank the forest, something which the profs teaching ID120 never forget to emphasize.

Another crib about Madras is about watering holes (or the lack of it). Well, it’s simple to understand. There is a water problem in the city. Water includes all types of it except saline water. But, for those in need, there’s dear old Pondy (no, not the one on DC) just as Goa would be to the guys in Bombay. (The reference to Goa is made only in passing and is in no way a statement on the character of the Goan.)

For the hip-hop kind, Madras lacks a newspaper with Page 3. There is one paper with Page 3, exported from the immediate northern neighbors to Madras. Well, sorry but even the newspaper supplier to the insti doesn’t think that to be worth of supplying. So, as of now, Madras is the bastion of a newspaper best enjoyed with morning filter kaapi. It may not have a Page 3 but the extent of its popularity can be gauged from the fact that even without a single hoarding, it is the media sponsor for every event worth talking about in town.

I said as of now because it has finally occurred to the largest English newspaper in the world that Chennai (Madras is the nick) has a huge unexploited market (they sat for two days in Gurunath and enticed people with bags, the less said about which the better) and they’ll set up shop in this place from the old Tamil New Year Day, which falls on April 14. Poor folks must have wanted it to be on the New Year Day as if it were a superstar release but got RGed because April 14 is now the old New Year Day, thanks to dear Karuna.

And, of course who can forget the mother of all clichés – ‘Conservative Chennai’. Chennai’s passion for its culture is mistaken for conservatism. What is also overlooked is now the traditional co-exists with the modern. For tell me one other place in India where a shop would serve filter kaapi in a davara-tumbler (where you can cool by measuring by the yard) and just across the road would be a coffee-bar where you could get cold coffee and cappuccino in a mug of your choice. This is easily demonstrated within our campus if we talk of Tifanys (with a recent price hike) and CCD (with prices already hiked). If there is a kadai which would serve idli- vada – sambar on a plantain leaf, there would be a pizzeria or a KFC just opposite. Go to T Nagar, you’ll find it.

And in Madras, if we have Bharatanatyam and Carnatic, we also have Salsa and Rock. ( In fact, the paper without Page 3 routinely carries a section on learning Salsa in 8 steps in its city supplement.)

Even if one leaves room for misunderstanding, Madras seems to the victim of an image trap. Orkut profiles still say ‘City: Chennai (for studies)’. And, the portrait of the Madras auto kaaran is superimposed on the inhabitants of a beautiful city.