Sakal

Daily Sakal

Sakal Masthead
Type	Daily newspaper
Format	Broadsheet
Owner	Sakal Media Group
Publisher	Sakal Media Group
Editor-in-chief	Shriram Pawar
Founded	1 January 1932
Language	Marathi
Circulation	15,00,000 Daily
Official website	http://www.esakal.com

Sakal (Marathi: सकाळ, meaning "Morning") is a Marathi language daily newspaper headquartered in Pune, Maharashtra, India. Sakal is the flagship newspaper of the foundation publication, Sakal Media Group. It ranks among the top 10 language dailies of India. It is Alexa's top ranked web-site in Marathi category.

It is published in Pune, Mumbai, Kolhapur, Nashik, Aurangabad, Nanded, Solapur, Nagpur, Satara, Amravati and Jalgaon.^{[citation needed]}

Dr. N. B. aka Nanasaheb Parulekar founded Sakal. Group’s other operations consist of regional newspapers, magazines and Internet publishing, together employing over 3000 people. It holds one of the largest Marathi website eSakal that reaches to 300,000 Internet users across globe.^{[citation needed]}

History

Daily Sakal's first issue. Published on 1st January 1932.

Sakal was a classic newspaper of the nationalist period. Its idealistic founder, Dr. N.B. alias Nanasaheb Parulekar had been influenced by American papers during his years at Columbia University. And though he started Sakal (morning) to advance Mahatma Gandhi’s movement for independence, he also introduced genuine daily journalism to Marathi.

Though begun as a part of the nationalist cause, it established itself as a successful business by making day-to-day concerns, not just of Pune but also of its rural neighborhoods, a preoccupation. By the 1960s, Sakal appointed full-time correspondents, each with a telephone, in every town in its neighborhood. It ran training camps for its journalists, promotions and cultural events for its readers and letters to the editor on its front page.

When Dr. Parulekar died in 1973, he left the paper with many good practices and rich traditions. It survived the first shocks of India’s revolution in newspaper technology and carried on for more than 10 years. The Pawar family took over Sakal in 1985. The Pawar family turned the paper into a public limited company in 1989, and Mr. Pratap G. Pawar became Managing Director.

List of Editors (HQ Pune) chronologically

• N. B. Parulekar – Jan 1, 1932 to Dec 31, 1943
• Ramchandra Balawant aka Babasaheb Ghorpade – Jan 1, 1944 to Feb 20, 1951
• N. B. Parulekar – Feb 21, 1951 to Jan 8, 1973
• Shridhar aka S. G. Mungekar – Jan 9, 1973 to Aug 14 1974 (Executive Editor)
• Shridhar aka S. G. Mungekar – Aug 15, 1974 to Feb 9, 1985 (Editor)
• V. D. Ranade – Feb 10, 1985 to Apr 30 1987
• S. K. Kulkarni – May 1, 1987 to Jul 31, 1987
• Vijay Kuwalekar – Aug 1, 1987 to Aug 7, 2000
• Anant Dixit – Aug 8, 2000 to Jul 15, 2005
• Yamaji Malkar – Jul 16, 2005 to May 9, 2009
• Sureshchandra Padhye – May 10, 2009 to Dec 1, 2010
• Uttam Kamble – May 10, 2009 to 31 July 2012 (Editor In Chief)
• Shriram Pawar - 1 Aug 2012 to till date (Editor In Chief)

Transition

The very first decade of the twenty first century saw changes in Sakal as a company. This decade saw changes in presentation, style, business expansion and many other levels.

Today

Sakal started a separate pull out for local content. A traditional Marathi newspaper, Sakal adopted ‘Today’, an English title of the pullout. In 2006 - 2007, ‘Today’ was launched across all major cities of Maharashtra. Pune edition initiated the pull out on 14 August 2006. It opened new avenues for local content as well local advertisers.

Garcia Design

It concentrated on multimedia activities and emerged as a Multimedia House. Newspaper designer Mario Garcia (Sr.) redesigned Sakal newspaper in year 2007-2008. The new look of Sakal was flashy, energetic and colorful. The masthead of Sakal changed to blue reverse. Garcia Design was implemented successfully across the Maharashtra.

Newzine

Year later, in 2010 Sakal adopted Newzine style of presenting the news. Newzine is the newly coined word derived from the News In The Form of Magazine. The word Newzine is in use since 2008 - 2009. This style gives detailed view focusing future insights for the readers, besides including contents that give an edge in their quest for better practices and prosperity. It took initiatives in solving key issues affecting the people.

Features

It has weekly supplements for the targeted sectors. Saptrang (सप्तरंग) for family (Sunday), Posiview on Finance (Monday), Jobz for employment (Tuesday), Education (Wednesday), Pratibimb for hyper-local content (Thursday), Family Doctor for holistic approach to health (Friday) and Balmitra (बालमित्र) for children (Saturday). One of the notable factor of its Sunday supplement, Saptrang is; it acts as a facilitator to the reader; to get the pool of knowledge.

Masthead

Its masthead is dark blue in color. Earlier the masthead was black. Each Sunday it used to publish red masthead. In year 2008 the masthead was changed to blue reverse. Masthead undergone many changes from style to typography.

Today Masthead

Tagline

Present tagline of Daily Sakal is ‘Uday Bhavishyapatracha’ (उदय भविष्यपत्राचा). Its literally meaning is “rise of the future newspaper”. The ideology behind the tag line is that the content is to consolidate its readers' awareness about the future. Earlier the tag line was ‘Mitra Navya Shatkacha’ (मित्र नव्या शतकाचा). Its literally meaning is ‘A friend of the New Century.’

Multimedia

From being a mono media, Sakal has transformed itself into Multimedia. Presently it has multiple platforms such as Print, TV, Mobile, On line as well as Events to deliver the content and advertisements.

Mobile apps

Sakal news was made available on smart mobiles through native apps. For Apple and Android

eSakal.com

Flagship website, www.eSakal.com also adopted new design designed by Mario Garcia (Jr.). It added interactivity. Also, epaper facility launched for various publications including Sakal. News-updates, interactive features, citizen journalism, dialogue with the users are the key elements of the website. The website consist of epaper facility for the user. The website is said to be popular among migrant Marathi community across globe, especially from United States of America, United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates and Australia.^{[citation needed]}

SMS

Sakal initiated Push SMS service; Sakal Live; for its registered users. It has started 54321 SMS short-code to serve News alerts and engagement activities with its readers.Many of users receive regular news updates from this service.

Saam TV

In year 2008,Sakal entered into Television business With a Marathi GEC (General Entertainment Channel), Saam TV.

Events

Events and activities is integral part of new Sakal. It arranges events targeting Education, Agriculture, Travel-Tourism, Business etc. Its international event, ‘EDUCON’ has now became the center stage for Vice Chancellors from across the India, to present their vision about Indian higher education.^{[citation needed]} Property Mahayatra, Education Mahayatra, MPL, Pune Shopping Festivals, Family Health, Sakal Shopping Festivals, Sakal Edugain, Sakal Investneet, Sakal Vastu, Sakal Shagun etc. are other some of the other events. The Group started clubs for the targeted audience events, Madhurangan (मधुरांगण) for women, Young Buzz and Sakal NIE (Newspaper In Education), Family Doctor Club are a few to mention.

Pune Bus Day

Pune bus day is an event created by Sakal Media Group. It is an initiative to improve traffic condition of Pune city. For Pune Bus Day, Sakal Media Group has taken an initiative to arrange 1,500 buses to the existing fleet of 1,650 PMPML buses and demonstrate how the use of optimum number of buses with high frequency can actually reduce the traffic congestion which are rampant in the city. The tagline of the initiative is 'Come, let's travel by PMPML bus on November 1'.
Presently, the lack of sufficient buses forces commuters to opt for private vehicles thus adding to problems like traffic congestion, vehicular pollution and increasing accidents. According to a study conducted by city-based NGO Parisar in 2009-10, the bus service run by the Pune Mahanagar Parivahan Mahamandal Limited (PMPML), was the most expensive, the worst in service and had the highest breakdown rate when compared to transport utilities run in Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru and Delhi.

A web based portal gives information about the bus route and other details which was developed by a pune based IT company. This portal carries real time information on bus schedules as provided by the PMPML

Books and Publications

Other publications include the English-language daily (that replaced The Maharashtra Herald), Gomantak, Gomantak Times, a Marathi and English language dailies respectively published from neighboring State of Goa. Agrowon, the first ever daily dedicated to agriculture and farming. Apart from these main issues many supplements are issued from Sakal Media Group like Pratibimb, Young Buzz, posiview(Financial supplement), Job Buzz etc. Sakal also publishes several books each month. It has a books publishing division to ranging from all variety of sections such as health, entertainment, sports, spiritual, children etc. ‘Ayurvediya Garbhsanskar’ by Shri. Balaji Tambe; ‘Timeless Inspirator’ edited by Dr. Raghunath Mashelkar, a comic strip book of Chintoo are some of the popular titles published by this division.^{[citation needed]}

Sakal Social Foundation

A social wing for the welfare of the society, Sakal Social Foundation works mainly in Maharashtra. Health, poverty, education, environment, governance are some of its prime areas of work.

Magazines

Sakal Group has variety of magazines. Sakal Saptahik (सकाळ साप्ताहिक). Sakal Saptahik stands at top in IRS (Indian Readership Survey).

Tanishka Logo

Tanishka (तनिष्का) is a monthly magazine targeting women readers. Premier (प्रीमियर) is the entertainment magazine publishes ins and outs of entertainment industry every month.