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Ajita Shashidhar

CHENNAI, April 1

THE English edition of the children's magazine series, Chandamama, is all set for a major facelift. Beginning May, the magazine will turn glossy and larger and will be filled with stories, puzzles, activity charts and an eight-page supplement, called Young Chandamama, for kids in the age group of five to eight years.

Mr Viswanatha Reddi, Managing Director, Chandamama India Ltd, says the revamped English edition of Chandamama is targeted at urban kids. "Our objective is to inculcate a reading habit among urban children which has taken a beating with the inroads of television and computers. Though the entire magazine is in story format, there are lots of quizzes, puzzles and interesting snippets associated with the stories which will definitely attract the children," he says.

Mr Reddi says the focus of the magazine will continue to be on Indian history, culture and mythology, but there would be sections on contemporary issues such as environment and ecology. "We are planning to invite more children's writers such as Ms Swapna Dutta to write for us," says Mr Reddi. Well-known writers for children such as Ruskin Bond and Manoj Das are already writing for the magazine.

Talking about Young Chandamama, Mr Reddi says, "The eight-page pull-out will contain activity-based stories which will have illustrations of the characters, which the children could colour. In some stories there may be dots which the children have to join and thereby sketch the character."

The new series of Chandamama is going to be priced at Rs 15, and will be available at book stores and magazine stalls across the country. Says Mr M. Sena Prasad, Marketing Manager, Chandamama India Ltd, "We are going to put up publicity material like posters at various points-of-sale and are also planning to go to schools with subscription offers."

The May issue of the magazine will also include a16-page summer special, which, according to Mr Reddi, is going to talk about handling summer the Indian way. "We are talking about how our forefathers used to beat the scorching heat without comforts like air-conditioners and fans, the kind of clothes they used to wear during summer, how kings used to build subterranean chambers, how Mughal Emperor, Babur, introduced watermelons in India and so on," says Mr Reddi.

"The summer supplements will also have activities such as colouring and pot-painting," he adds.

The company is planning a door-to-door sales campaign for the summer issue and is targeting a sale of at least 20,000 copies through this campaign, according to Mr Prasad.

A 16-page supplement on bio-diversity would be part of the June issue of the magazine. "The contents for the supplement will be provided by Pune-based NGO Kalpavrikasha, and the supplement is to mark the World Environment Day," says Mr Reddi.

Though Chandamama India Ltd doesn't have major plans to revamp its 11 regional language editions, the company is planning to foray into CD-ROMS, which, according to Mr Reddi, will also be in a story format.

Chandamama, with its multilingual editions, says Mr Reddi, has a circulation of three lakh copies, with the company's turnover being approximately Rs 5 crore.

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