Tehelka is a weekly newspaper in India known for its public-interest journalism. It is a challenger brand compared to established papers like ‘Times Of India’ and ‘Hindustan Times’. The goal of this communication is to enable a challenger newspaper make a bold statement. And to clearly establish a position consistent with the newspaper’s DNA.

The investment on this effort has not been large since it involves just black and white printing on newsprint and is undertaken in the newspaper’s press itself. The distribution is free, since the posters go with the paper. The response however has been electrifying. Reader’s look forward to the next poster and pour in suggestions on what the next topic should be. The value to the Tehelka brand is immeasurably large, since it is rapidly adding to the newspaper’s desired perception of being India’s only newspaper devoted to public-interest journalism.

Various large-size posters were distributed free of cost with the Tehelka newspaper. These simple, starkly designed posters had messages like ‘Banned Medicines Availabe’ ‘Bribes Gladly Accepted’ ‘Black Tickets Sold Here’ (in India various cinema theatres are involved in creating artificial shortages and selling tickets of popular movies at prohibitive prices). Readers were urged to paste these posters at places where they experienced such corrupt activities, thus bringing them out in the open in very embarrassing fashion.

These posters have built into a sort of ‘people’s movement’. Tehelka is already known as ‘The Newspaper That Involves You’. These posters seek to expose daily irritants in the common man’s life, like traffic cops asking for bribes, medicines/vaccines being sold way past their expiry date, black-marketing of cinema tickets. Other posters have had messages like ‘Our Water Connection Has Failed. How Much Bribe To Get It Going Again?’ ‘The Municipality Is Proud Of The Potholes On This Road’. These posters have touched the aspects of life that are very significant to common people. The strategy has offered extreme visibility and curiosity about the paper across audience constituencies.

Tehelka has already unearthed serious scams in India. It has forced different organisations, including the government to take corrective measures. The innovative media strategy we are presenting has given the very readers who trust and admire Tehelka their chance to get actively involved in the newspaper’s crusade to expose corruption and hypocrisy.