Urdu daily The Inquilab to be launched from Lucknow

Jagran Prakashan launches the first edition of The Inquilab, a year after acquiring Mid-Day Multimedia, owner of the Urdu daily.

Jagran Prakashan (JPL) is launching the Urdu newspaper The Inquilab from Lucknow on May 27. JPL bought over Mid-Day Multimedia in May 2010, and The Inquilab was a part of the deal.

The Inquilab is targeted at the upmarket, affluent, Urdu-speaking population across a range of markets in the North. The daily is being positioned as a family newspaper, with content for everyone. There will be dedicated content space for women, kids and youth, apart from the regular national and international news, sports, city, business and entertainment.

Post this launch, the group has lined up more editions from other markets of UP, Delhi and Bihar.

The Inquilab will, on an average, be a 12-page newspaper on weekdays, and a 16-page newspaper on weekends. Additionally, there will be two supplements -- one on Fridays, and the other on Sundays.

To promote the launch, the group has planned a series of launch campaigns supporting the new edition, both at the reader, as well as the industry levels.

Shahid Latif, the editor for The Inquilab, and who has been responsible for the makeover of the newspaper, has been at the helm of affairs since 2004. Under his overall guidance, the content planning has been done for all new editions.

Shakeel Shamsi is the editor for the North editions. He has 25 years of experience in Journalism, across media types. Shamsi has authored over 12 books, and is the recipient of the Bharatendu Award.

According to a company spokesperson, "There are many Urdu newspapers in the market, and it's a fairly competitive space. However, our positioning of The Inquilab as a nationalistic paper will be the key differentiator. The Inquilab is India's oldest and largest read Urdu newspaper, and these credentials give us an edge in the market. While the print runs for Urdu papers are small, the readership numbers are huge."

For the record, with the launch of The Inquilab's Lucknow edition, JPL now has 82 editions across four languages, covering 14 states.