Sunday

About Sunday

Overview

Sunday was an English-language political newsweekly published from Kolkata by the Ananda Bazar Patrika (ABP) group. Launched in the mid-1970s by the young journalist M. J. Akbar, it became known for investigative and political reporting and a bold, iconoclastic editorial style. Under the later editorship of Vir Sanghvi it became India's largest-selling English-language newsmagazine. The magazine ceased publication in the late 1990s. This profile is a historical account of a publication that is now defunct.

Launch

Sunday was established in 1976 as a new weekly by the Calcutta-based Ananda Bazar Patrika group, which ran the dominant Bengali daily. Its founding editor was Mobashar Jawed Akbar, known as M. J. Akbar, who was appointed to the role in 1976 while still in his mid-twenties. Akbar had joined the Times of India as a trainee in 1971 and in 1973 had been named editor of Onlooker, a fortnightly magazine; Sunday was his first major editorial venture as the head of a weekly. The magazine was conceived as a political weekly that would break important stories and pursue investigative journalism.

Editorial character

Sunday pioneered a bold, iconoclastic style of journalism that broke with the ponderousness of much Indian print media of the period. It became known for its political and investigative stories, its willingness to take on controversial subjects, and its sharp writing. The magazine quickly became popular, establishing a national reputation for its coverage of politics and current affairs.

The M. J. Akbar years

Akbar edited Sunday for six years, from 1976 to 1982, building it into a nationally noted title. His success at Sunday led to his next major assignment: in 1982 he was instrumental in launching The Telegraph, the ABP group's English daily, which successfully challenged The Statesman as the leading newspaper of Calcutta. Akbar's example at Sunday and The Telegraph transformed Indian journalism, and he was recognised while still in his mid-thirties as one of the country's finest editors. He later founded the Asian Age newspaper and went on to a career in politics and authorship.

The Vir Sanghvi years

In 1986, Vir Sanghvi became the editor of Sunday at the age of 30. Sanghvi, born in London in 1956 and educated at Mayo College, Ajmer, Mill Hill School, London, and Brasenose College, Oxford, had earlier been the founder-editor of Bombay magazine at 22 — among the youngest editors in Indian journalism — and had presided over the relaunch of the monthly features magazine Imprint in 1983. Under Sanghvi's editorship, Sunday became India's largest-selling English-language newsmagazine. His tenure at the magazine lasted twelve years, a distinguished stint that cemented Sunday's position as the country's leading newsmagazine and made Sanghvi one of the best-known faces in Indian journalism.

National prominence

During the Sanghvi years, Sunday was described as the country's largest-selling magazine, a position it held as an English-language newsmagazine. The magazine's combination of political reporting, investigative stories and feature writing gave it a readership across the country, and it competed directly with India Today, the other major English newsmagazine of the era. Contemporary media histories place Sunday alongside India Today and The Week in the front rank of Indian periodicals practising investigative journalism — titles that, in the words of one press survey, "stole a march over the English dailies" in uncovering scandals and spotlighting ongoing controversies, both political and apolitical.

The ABP Group

Sunday was published by the Ananda Bazar Patrika group, one of eastern India's leading media houses. The group publishes the Bengali daily Anandabazar Patrika, first published in 1922, and the English daily The Telegraph, launched in 1982. The group's publishing interests extended across newspapers and magazines, and Sunday was its flagship English newsmagazine through the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.

Closure

Sunday ceased publication in the late 1990s. In 1997, after his twelve-year stint as editor of the magazine, Vir Sanghvi was appointed consulting editor for the Ananda Bazar Patrika group — covering The Telegraph in English and Anandabazar Patrika in Bengali — and also moved into television with the Star Network. Sunday did not continue beyond this period. The closure ended a run of roughly two decades as one of India's most influential English newsmagazines, spanning the Emergency's aftermath, the Janata years, the Indira and Rajiv Gandhi eras and the economic liberalisation of the 1990s.

Legacy

Sunday is remembered as a training ground and showcase for two of the most prominent editors in Indian journalism, M. J. Akbar and Vir Sanghvi, and as a title that demonstrated the appetite for aggressive political and investigative journalism in magazine form. Its bold editorial style influenced a generation of Indian journalists. Its editors went on to shape Indian media far beyond the magazine: Akbar through The Telegraph, the Asian Age and his books, and Sanghvi through the Hindustan Times and a parallel career in television that began while he was still editing Sunday, with shows on Doordarshan and later the Star network. Along with The Illustrated Weekly of India, Sunday belongs to the era when the English newsmagazine was a central institution of Indian public life, before the rise of 24-hour television news changed the economics of weekly journalism.

Inside Akbar's newsroom

Akbar was an outsider in Calcutta journalism — unlike most of his fellows, he was not from an established Bengali family or the Anglo-Indian community — but he quickly made his mark as a hands-on editor, taking charge of a staff of about a dozen people. The journalist SNM Abdi, who worked with Sunday, later recalled an editor who came to the office even on Sundays, had little faith in sub-editing, and rewrote stories from top to bottom — sometimes rewriting half a dozen 1,000–1,500-word magazine stories in a single day on his Olivetti typewriter. This intensity shaped the magazine's voice: Sunday broke several important stories and pioneered the bold, iconoclastic style that became its hallmark. Contemporary accounts credit the magazine with demonstrating that a weekly could set the national news agenda through investigative reporting; front-rank Indian periodicals of the era — India Today, Sunday and The Week — were noted for having stolen a march over the English dailies in investigative journalism.

After Sunday: Akbar, the Telegraph and beyond

In 1982, after six years at Sunday, Akbar was instrumental in launching The Telegraph, the ABP group's English daily, which successfully unseated The Statesman as the leading newspaper of Calcutta. On the eve of the 1989 general election he left journalism to contest — and win — a Lok Sabha seat in Bihar for the Congress, serving as a Congress spokesperson under Rajiv Gandhi before quitting the party at the end of 1992. He returned to journalism, and in February 1994 launched the Asian Age, India's first newspaper conceived with an international edition; in May 2005 the Deccan Chronicle acquired a 67 per cent stake in it. Akbar later founded the fortnightly Covert and, in January 2010, the weekly newspaper The Sunday Guardian. As an author he has written books including a biography of Jawaharlal Nehru titled Nehru: The Making of India, Kashmir: Behind the Vale, Riot after Riot, India: The Siege Within and Blood Brothers. Sunday, his first creation, remained the template: a weekly built around a strong editor, political nerve and investigative ambition.