DB Corp Ltd, the publisher of Dainik Bhaskar, will launch a Hindi business paper by the end of July, the Mint newspaper has reported.
Executives told the newspaper that while a formal date for the launch has not been fixed, the paper, to be called Bhaskar Business, will launch in all the strong markets of the Dainik Bhaskar and will likely have 10-15 editions.
Yatish Rajawat, a former associate editor at Business World magazine, has been named the editor of the project and is joining the company on Thursday.
Some background material:
DB Corp.’s long-time rival, Jagran Prakashan Ltd, which publishes the Dainik Jagran, India’s largest read daily, announced in December an equal-stakes joint venture with Television Eighteen India Ltd to publish business dailies in regional languages. The chief executive of that joint venture, Bharat Kapadia, was formerly an executive director of the Bhaskar Group.
The Hindi business news market is seeing a lot of action with several new titles—dailies as well as magazines—being launched. Business Standard Ltd and Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd have launched versions of their English business dailies, Business Standard and The Economic Times, in Hindi and Gujarati. Amar Ujala Group, publisher of Hindi daily Amar Ujala, has also announced plans to launch a Hindi business daily by the end of 2008.
In English, there are five national stand-alone business dailies with a sixth starting operations in two southern cities earlier this month.
One of the executives said Bhaskar Business will likely launch in the parent’s key markets first to utilize production, distribution and advertising synergies.
The paper could very likely also have a Gujarati version as the group already publishes a leading Gujarati daily—Divya Bhaskar—and Gujarat is a big market for business news.
