Thaliru to become bimonthly

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: 'Thaliru', Balasahithya Institute's flagship magazine devoted to inculcate social awareness and reading habits among children above kindergarten age, will henceforth cease to be a monthly. From July, the children's magazine helmed by Sugatha Kumari will come out twice a month.''Reading habits of children have changed. Other children's magazines such as 'Kalikudukka', 'Balarama' and 'Balabhoomi' are weeklies. Children seem to need more continuity. Though it would be hard for us to turn 'Thaliru' into a weekly, we can at least bring it out twice a month,'' said magazine editor Rubin D'Cruz.Also, the editors have with them a surfeit of materials which they are not able to publish in the monthly. In the latest issue, for instance, the editors could not include Sugatha Kumari's monthly interpretation of 'Mahabharatham' and also Prakash Murthy's illustrated series 'Satyajithum Lokathile Rahashyangalum' (Satyajit and the world's secrets). The increase in frequency will help them incorporate more, at least the regulars. Once the magazine comes out twice a month, the number of pages per issue will come down to 48 from 64. But the number of pages will in effect increase because there will be two issues a month.'Thaliru' aims to attract the serious readers among children, especially teenagers."There is no good magazine for teenagers. Parents are interested in buying books only for children below the age of five. After that studies take over. Therefore a magazine for the slightly older lot is not a commercially viable prospect,'' Rubin said.'Thaliru' carries regular articles by legends like M T Vasudevan Nair and Sugatha Kumari. Poet Rose Mary and other noted writers like B Murali and K R Meera pen children's stories for the magazine. This issue features a poem by Sugatha Kumari. There is also an article written by her 'Kaadu' (forest). The next one will have a poem by neorealist poet K Satchidanandan.The idea is to make 'Thaliru' more contemporary. ''We will concentrate more on social campaigns through the magazine,'' Rubin said. The current issue has a campaign against cruelty towards elephants in which the articles are written by children themselves. Book reviews in 'Thaliru' are also done by children, especially students in classes ninth and tenth.Rubin says the major contribution of 'Thaliru' is to put out sui generis illustrated features.''Other children's magazines feature syndicated comic strips, strips that are common to all such magazines. At 'Thaliru', our struggle is to create our own comics with our own artists like Prakash Murthy,'' Rubin said.