In addition to the above regular feature, I have enclosed a short write-up on

" My Nostalgic Memories of The Hindu 65 years ago". This will particularly interest those who are conversant with

old Bangalore of the forties and fifties. This is better read after reading the main feature.

Best wishes


THE HINDU—India’s National Newspaper since 1878
--Strange circumstances of its birth and further growth


The genesis of today’s newspapers could be traced back to the days of Romans under Julius Caesar in the first Century B.C. He started issuing handwritten public announcements called the ‘Acta Diurna’ which means ‘daily events’. In the year 59 B.C. a summary of these debates in the Roman Senate was published under the title ‘Acta Senatus’. These were pasted on walls at convenient places for the people to read. But soon some government officials objected to the people knowing too much about them and therefore they were discontinued. Probably the censorship of the press had its beginning here.

In the 15th century in Europe, printing presses came into vogue and the printed word became the most important means of communication. Newssheets could now be produced faster and more easily. The first newspaper appeared in the 16th century and contained mainly commercial news. Later political news got introduced. Finally the first newspaper of public interest was published in German language in Germany in 1609.

Printing technology came to India in 1550 A.D. when the Portuguese imported the first printing press. However, the first newssheets came out much later when the Britishers had set up their Presidency administrations in Calcutta and Madras. These newssheets were meant to keep the two distant outposts informed about what was happening to their fellow countrymen. During the days of the East India Company, one Britisher by name James Hicky brought out his newspaper called ‘Bengal Gazette’ in 1870. The writings in his paper did not go too well with the government and Hicky was arrested and jailed two years later. Other newspapers started but they were fist censored by the government before the news got published. All the newspapers in the country were run only by the Europeans and exclusively for the benefit of the Europeans.

At the time The Hindu appeared on the journalistic scene of Madras in 1878, there was only one newspaper in Madras called ‘Madras Mail’ which was started in 1867 and which had absorbed an earlier newspaper called ‘Madras Times’ started in 1860. These two British newspapers were intended to protect and further the interests of the European community. There was no Indian newspaper to represent Indian opinion which was agitating the minds of some intellectuals in Madras. This feeling became stronger when the Madras Mail [British owned] criticized the appointment of Mr. [later Sir] T.Muthuswamy Aiyer as judge of the Madras High Court in unfair and unflattering terms. However, they could not give vent to their own feelings in any newspaper. Unable to stand this gross justice to Indians, six of such intellectuals namely G. Subramania Aiyer, M.Veraraghavachariar, T.T.Rangachariar, P.V.Rangachariar, D.Keshava Rao Pant and N.Subba Rau Pantulu—all of them in their twenties and still fresh from the college, founded The Hindu on 20th September 1878.




They had little capital and no experience in running a newspaper. They were all members of a society called ‘The Triplicane Literary Society’ which was an important forum for intellectuals to meet where they could gather public opinion and discuss current political topics. Since they had no money with them they borrowed one rupee and three quarters of a rupee [One rupee and twelve annas, since 16 annas made one rupee] and printed 80 copies of the first newspaper. They wrote in The Hindu that the appointment of Mr. Muthuswamy Aiyer was absolutely right and a correct decision. They also condemned the editorials that had appeared in the British press in India. The Hindu was born as a weekly, published every Wednesday and later the date was changed to Thursday. Declaring with the aims and objectives of The Hindu, the editorial said, inter alias,
“The principles that we propose to be guided by are simply those of fairness and justice to all. It will always be our opinion to promote harmony and union among fellow countrymen and to interpret correctly the feelings of the natives and to create mutual confidence between the governed and the governors.”

The early editions of The Hindu were printed in a press in Mint Street, George Town, Madras. When it became a tri-weekly in 1883 The Hindu moved to its own premises at 100, Mount Road, Madras where it functioned for the next 55 tears. The press was equipped with borrowed capital. One of the chief benefactors of The Hindu was Justice S.Subramania Aiyer who had taken a deep interest in The Hindu from 1884. When the paper became a tri-weekly the expenditure mounted and the paper then sought commercial advertisements and donations. In the very beginning it was a small paper and was published every Wednesday evening. Sometime later the date was changed to Thursday to accommodate notifications and postings from the Fort St. George Gazette.
The annual subscription was Rs. 8 only and most people who could not afford it could opt for quarterly subscription of Rs. 2 per quarter. To start with they were hand printed. Parcels to the railway station were carried in horse driven jutkas. With the arrival of the bicycle, newspaper distribution and sales were considerably facilitated. The Maharaja of Vizianagaram was a great patron of The Hindu and he was responsible for enabling The Hindu to purchase the rented building at 100, Mount Road, Madras which housed The Hindu and the National Press. When the Maharaja passed away in 1897, The Hindu lost a great patron and the financial troubles for the paper started.

The newspaper- reading public was limited in those days. Students were the main readers but they could not afford to subscribe. Many times a few of them joined together and subscribed for one paper. Generally the Munsif or the Subordinate Judge used to be a subscriber. Out of his large heartedness he used to share the newspaper with others in the locality. By the time the paper reached the last of the readers, a month would have elapsed and by the time the owner got it back, it would have been in a crumpled condition and occasionally torn. With the passage of time, the regular readers became impatient and found it difficult to wait for two days to get the subsequent issue. When this came to the notice of the proprietors, The Hindu became a daily with effect from 1st April 1889, eleven years after its birth. When Bipin Chanra Pal, one of the most famous patriots and freedom fighters of the 19th century forming the trio Lal-Bal-Pal [ Lala Lajpat Rai, Bala Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal] visited Madras in 1881, he found that The Hindu had “ had already become a great power and influence for good in the Madras Presidency. It has opened up anew chapter in the history of Indo-English journalism owned and edited by Indians which represented the opinions of the English educated community directly in Madras and indirectly of the other Indian provinces too”
1st April 1905 marked a milestone in the history of th26 year old The Hindu. On that day, one S.Kasturiranga Iyengar purchased The Hindu from M. Veeraraghavachar,
one of the original owners of the paper. Iyengar’s decision to purchase the paper was a great relief to the owner since the newspaper was facing many mounting financial problems to run and maintain it. S.Kasturiranga Iyengar was who was a successful lawyer in Coimbatore had just then shifted his office from Coimbatore to Madras. Iyengar did take a bold risk in the purchase of The Hindu, a Nationalist Newspaper, since journalism was a hazardous profession in those days when the country was under foreign domination. But Iyengar was a great patriot and nationalist and he thought that the purchase of the paper would give an opportunity for him to serve the country better, in spite of the risk involved. Within a year of the purchase, Iyengar turned The Hindu round and made it a successful and popular newspaper.

Nothing could be a greater tribute to the sagacity, wisdom and farsightedness of Kasturi Rangaiyengar that even today, age old readers of The Hindu like myself even now consider the names ‘KASTURI’ and ‘THE HINDU” as synonymous



B.M.N.Murthy.

My Nostalgic Memories of The Hindu

I have been reading The Hindu for over 65 years ever since I joined the Malleshwaram High school, Bangalore in 1944. We were staying in an adjacent extension called Sriramapuram. Most residents in our area belonged to the middle class Brahmin families and none could afford any newspaper. The only person known to us who subscribed to The Hindu was our Municipal Councilor M.Krishnswamy Pillay and also the only person to own a car in our area.

Our access to The Hindu was through the Public Reading Room near our house. This was located in a small room admeasuring 10’x 10’ with only one entrance door and no windows at all. The flooring was of Cuddapah stones and the room had only one incandescent light. The flooring was covered with a partially torn gymkhana donated by a member. We had to squat on the gymkhana and read.

In the forties there used to be only one edition of The Hindu, printed and published in Madras. It used to be out late in the evening. Outstation copies were dispatched to respective destinations by the night trains. In Bangalore we were getting The Hindu the next day early in the morning through the Madras-Bangalore Mail which used to reach Bangalore early in the morning. Local distribution was done through a vendor on foot. We would get the paper by about 8 A.M. by which time the Reading room opened.

In our Reading Room there were only four of us who were interested in reading The Hindu. Two of us were high school students and the other two were retired gumastas [clerks] from the Athara Kacheri which housed the offices of the Government of Mysore. All the others members were quite content with reading the local Kannada newspaper ‘Tainadu.’ We, two of us [students], used to wait anxiously at the entrance to receive The Hindu from the vendor. Those days The Hindu contained only three sheets running to twelve pages and the front page covered all the important events. As each one of was anxious to read, we distributed the sheets with the other two also.. The person who received the paper was normally one of us, students, and we had the privilege of keeping the front page and distribute the other two.. Two of us, both students, would then read the first page jointly and then exchange the same with the others, as and when they completed. Sometimes our patience used to get exhausted as the pensioners were habitually slow readers. Fortunately The Hindu is the only newspaper in the country wherein the news is not continued in the other pages. Hence, less of suspense.

With the starting of The Independence Movement on 15th August 1947, the others also wanted to read the front page of The Hindu first. With a view to obliging all the members, either my friend or I used to read out the front page aloud so that all members would be benefited at the same time.


B. M. N. Murthy


B.M.N.Murthy, Saturday 18th July 2009
ARTICLE NO. 509--THE HINDU--India's National Newspaper since 1878
Created: Friday, July 17, 2009 9:29 PM