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Our Bureau

Hyderabad, Sept. 1 Chandamama India Ltd has undertaken a series of initiatives to re-build its brand in the Indian market – one of which is to launch hard copies of its archives early next year.

“The idea is to present the books of the past as year-wise editions. We currently have got a pilot, the 1949 November book of Telugu version in digital format,” Mr L. Subramanyan, Chief Executive Officer, Chandamama, said on the sidelines of an event here on Sunday. He added that though the process might sound simple, it is a tedious job as paper in some of the old books is coming apart. The company intends to launch these books in January 2009.

Mr Subramanyan also said they will be launching three more comic books by mid-September. “We have already launched three comics – Mystery of the unknown prince Arya, the famous detective duo Eli-Puli’s exciting Operation Bobby and Garuda, the invincible. Now we will be launching a 400-page Ramayana in comic format, Secret Agent Surya and The Code Crackers,” he said.

Chandamama from now on intends to launch one comic every month and a series every quarter.

The company also intends to launch ‘Chandamama Books’, which will have a collection of various stories from the past editions.

The company has plans to introduce old stories in a contemporary format. “The first in the Neo Classics series that we will be launching in November is on Krishna. We have found that children do not read mythology as it is not the ‘cool’ format, so without losing the essence of the story we plan to launch this Neo Classics that will be more reminiscent of animation in an art form,” he said.

It also plans to launch Chandamama on mobiles by October for which it has tied up with two operators. Chandamama is also in the process of tying up with two studios to make animation flicks of 90 minutes each. “Also the version II of our online edition is under construction which will have better features than what is on now. The intention is to roll this out by October,” he said.

The company which currently publishes books in 13 languages is also exploring new languages to publish the magazine. “Though it is too early to comment on what language will be next, it is sure that it will be before the end of the fiscal,” he said.

Mr Subramanyan also said the current circulation is around 4.82 lakh, up from 1.1 lakh a year ago when the new management took over. He said the target is to touch 1 million copies by August next year.

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