The November 6, 2008 front page of The New Indian Express |
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| Type | Daily newspaper |
| Format | Broadsheet |
| Owner | Express Publications (Madurai) Limited |
| Editor-in-chief | Prabhu Chawla |
| Founded | 1932 in Madras, British India, Bifurcated from Indian Express and renamed in August 13, 1999 |
| Political alignment | Centrist |
| Language | English |
| Headquarters | Express Gardens, II Main Road, Chennai - 600 058 |
| Circulation | 309,252 daily (source: ABC January-June 2009). |
| OCLC number | 243883379 |
| Official website | Expressbuzz.com |
The New Indian Express is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper published by the Express Publications. It was founded in 1932 as the Indian Express, under the ownership of Chennai-based P. Varadarajulu Naidu. In 1991, following the death of the then owner Ramnath Goenka, the Goenka family split the group into two separate companies. Initially, the two groups shared the Indian Express title, and editorial and other resources. But in 13 August 1999, the northern editions, headquartered in Mumbai, retained and renamed Indian Express as The Indian Express, while the southern editions became The New Indian Express. Today, the two newspapers and the two companies are separate entities. The newspaper is known for its intrepid and anti-establishment tone. Express Publications (Madurai) Limited publishes the The New Indian Express from 21 centres in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Orissa.
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Indian Express was first published on September 5, 1932 in Madras (now Chennai) by an Ayurvedic doctor and Indian National Congress member P Varadarajulu Naidu, publishing from the same press at which he ran the 'Tamil Nadu' Tamil weekly. But soon, on account of financial difficulties, he sold it to S Sadanand, founder of The Free Press Journal, another English newspaper.
In 1933, The Indian Express opened its second office in Madurai and launched the Tamil daily Dinamani on September 11, 1934. Sadanand introduced several innovations and reduced the price, but later sold part of his stake in the form of convertible debentures to Ramnath Goenka due to financial difficulties. Later, when The Free Press Journal further went into financial decline in 1935, Sadanand lost ownership of Indian Express after a long controversial court battle with Goenka, where blows were exchanged between some of the parties. Finally, a year later, Goenka bought the rest of the 26 per cent stake from Sadanand, and the paper came under the control of Goenka, who took the already anti-establishment tone of the paper to greater heights. Also at that time it had to face stiff competition from a well established The Hindu and the Mail, besides other prominent newspapers. In the late 1930s, the circulation was no more than 2,000.
In 1939 Goenka bought out Andhra Prabha, another prominent Telugu Daily. Later it gained the name Three Musketeers for the three dailies. In 1940 the whole premises were gutted by fire. The Hindu, its rival, helped considerably in re-launching the paper, by getting it printed temporarily at one of its Swadesimithran’s press and later offering its recently vacated premises in Madras at 2, Mount Road later to become the landmark Express Estates. This relocation also helped the Express obtain better high speed printing machines, while some claimed the Goenka had deliberately set fire to escape financial embarrassment.
In later years, Goenka started the Mumbai edition with the landmark Express Towers as his office when the Morning Standard was bought by him in 1944. Two years later it became the Mumbai edition of The Indian Express. Later on, editions were started in several cities like Madurai (1957), Bangalore (1965) and Ahmedabad (1968). The Financial Express was launched in 1961 from Mumbai, Kannada Prabha (Kannada Daily) from Bangalore in 1965 and a Bangalore edition of the Telugu Daily Andhra Prabha, and Gujarati dailies Lok Satta and Jansatta in 1952, from Ahmedabad and Baroda.
The Delhi edition started was when the Tej group's Indian News Chronicle was acquired in 1951, which from 1953 became the Delhi edition of Indian Express. In 1990 it bought the Sterling group of magazines, and along with it the Gentleman magazine.
After Goenka's demise in 1991, two of the family members split the group into Indian Express Mumbai with all the North Indian editions, while the Southern editions were grouped as Express Madurai Ltd with Chennai as headquarters.
The New Indian Express is now published from all major cities in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala besides Orissa, including Chennai (Madras), Coimbatore , Hyderabad, Bangalore, Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Bhubaneswar Shimoga, Madurai and Tiruchirappalli. On the whole, it publishes from 22 centres in the south.
The New Indian Express has a net paid circulation of 435,618 copies (Source: ABC J-D, 2010). The NIE achieves its biggest penetration (paid sales per head of population) in the state of Kerala. It also claims to be the first Indian newspaper to give insurance benefits to its subscribers. The New Indian Express is published in a geographical area that covers approximately 24 per cent of the national population. The New Sunday Express (the Sunday edition of the NIE) is arguably the flagship publication, with magazine supplements incorporating both national and international themes and sections on developmental issues, society, politics, literature, arts, cinema, travel, lifestyle, sports, new-age living, self-development and entertainment.
During late 2007/early 2008, there was a big shakeout of editorial staff, with many old hands leaving to make way for new. In April 2008, the newspaper underwent a major, drastic and exceptionally modern layout and design makeover and launched a huge advertising campaign.
In October 2007, The New Indian Express launched a 40-page Friday magazine supplement (now, total colour) called "Indulge" exclusively for the Chennai edition. In September 2010, the lifestyle pullout began publishing its Bangalore edition.
It also renamed all the city supplements, calling them City Express and focusing more on the respective city's culture and lifestyle, rather than hard news. Its other supplements, which appear on a weekly or fortnightly basis, are on career and education. The 24-page education supplement, called edex, was launched in early 2010.
At present, The New Indian Express is the only national daily which publishes news of far-flung Andaman and Nicobar Islands on an everyday basis. The TNIE has a staffer at Port Blair, the capital city of the remote archipelago.
The New Indian Express Group of Companies also publishes Dinamani in Tamil and Kannada Prabha in Kannada and the following magazines: Cinema Express (Tamil), Malayalam Vaarika (Malayalam) and Tamilan Express (Tamil). The Group runs the following websites: