One Good Year, More To Come

October 16, 1996

Dear Reader,

To celebrate one year of existence is to invite ridicule. After all, even a shoddy publication is likely to survive 12 months quite simply because the proprietor, however depleted and disappointed, will persevere in the expectation that his weak infant might grow strong and prosperous in the near future. The ridicule is compounded for a weekly magazine which, unlike a daily paper, accumulates in the given period a meagre 52 issues, and has therefore even less justification for self-congratulation.

Nevertheless, the initial outing of a new ‘product’ is critical since it sends out early warning signals indicating whether the publishing venture is destined to be a winner or a loser. Indeed, the whiff of success or failure, particularly the latter, where publishing is concerned, is easy to smell. At the risk of sounding immodest, Outlook from the day the first issue hit the stands gave hints that a winner had been born. Since the magazine by common consensus is now widely perceived as an editorial and marketing success (you can’t have one without the other) with of course many miles to go, our first year’s output can confidently be offered for stringent critical evaluation.

I do not propose to bore you with the ‘hits’ we have scored since birth, but merely to reiterate that our mandate remains what it was on October 11, 1995: to comprehensively wrap up the week which has passed and to intelligently speculate on the week ahead. Naturally, in the ensuing months we plan to widen and deepen our coverage of current events in India and also in the neighbourhood, so that this magazine becomes the authoritative voice of the region by the region for the world. Additionally, we will be performing some editorial fine-tuning without changing thrust or original format.

All my working life, which spans 20-odd years, I have consistently set myself a single professional goal: to make serious journalism popular. And to achieve this goal without over-simplification or trivialisation or sensationalism. Our Republic today is confronted, nay engulfed in, life or death dilemmas of Byzantine complexity—judicial activism, how to deal with corrupt politicians and public servants, Centre-state relations, the role of transnational corporations, quantum of autonomy for special regions, cultural nationalism, less or more reservations for disadvantaged sectors, poverty eradication etc—which appear at once daunting and insoluble. As if that were not enough, many of those we elect for high public office are not only spectacularly inept but engaged single-mindedly in lining their suitcases. It is no surprise, then, that the dominant mood in the nation is of mounting cynicism bordering on total despair. In such gloom the print media’s prime responsibility is to get readers engaged, concerned and possibly angry; not turned off by doctrinaire or arcane or over-detailed presentation of perplexing issues. I can assure you that in the next 12 months we will continue to strive to fulfil our part of the responsibility.

Last year in the launch issue of Outlook I had tentatively predicted on this very page a shake-out in the frenzied cable television industry and some sort of revival of the print media. I am happy to report that something along those lines has actually taken place. Can Outlook claim small credit for the development? Anyway, we fervently hope the trend continues and consolidates.

Finally, a confession. When Outlook took the plunge all of us on the magazine were cautiously optimistic about its chances. To tell the truth, more cautious than optimistic. Certainly, I had no inkling that the response from readers and advertisers would be so positive and so prompt. We sometimes have to remind ourselves that we are only 12 months old! Thank you for your interest, encouragement and support. I hope all three will be available to us in the next 12 months. And the next....