S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar

S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar (15 December 1859 – 12 December 1923) was an Indian lawyer, Indian independence activist, politician and journalist who served as the managing director of The Hindu from 1 April 1905 until his death.

Ancestry and family

Iyengar was born into a family whose paternal forebears came from Kumbakonam, in the Cauvery (Kaveri) delta, in Tanjore District, in British India. His eldest brother, Diwan Bahadur S. Srinivasa Raghavaiyangar, served as the Inspector General of Registration in the Madras Presidency. Srinivasa Raghavaiyangar, in 1893, wrote Memorandum of Progress of the Madras Presidency during the last forty years of British administration to refute the charges of economic exploitation made by nationalists. Yet another elder brother, Soundararaja Iyengar, was the father of Sangeetha Kalanidhi awardee T. Brinda, and he was Deputy Collector in Madras and Kumbhakonam, and was associated with Madras Music Academy. The Music Academy confers an award in the memory of Kasturi Ranga Iyengar.

Early life

Kasturi Ranga Iyengar was born on 15 December 1859 in the village Innambur in Kumbakonam. On completion of his education, he moved to Coimbatore to commence practice as a lawyer. He set up a prosperous vocation and moved to Madras to try his luck there. He was not as successful in Madras as he had been in Coimbatore. Eventually, in 1895, he became a legal correspondent with The Hindu which was run by G. Subramania Iyer. He wrote a well-known column in the newspaper The Coimbatore Letters. During this period, he also got ample encouragement from C. Karunakara Menon. Iyengar - and under his stewardship, The Hindu, became powerful voices for Indian opinion and independence.

As managing director In July 1905, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar appointed his nephew A. Rangaswami Iyengar as assistant editor. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar worked to rescue The Hindu by increasing advertisements and terminating subscriptions to customers who did not pay in advance. The tactic proved successful and Kasturi Ranga Iyengar was able to clear his debts by 1910. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar subscribed to the Reuters news service and allotted space for weather reports, court cases, trade and commerce as well as sports. In 1905, The Hindu, in its editorial, demanded partial autonomy but not independence for India. It also strongly criticised Annie Besant and her Theosophical Society, including her lavish promotional campaign of J. Krishnamurti as the Maitreya Buddha. However, The Hindu offered its enthusiastic support to her Home Rule Movement and protested her internment at the orders of Lord Pentland. It also strongly condemned the protests and the resultant killings of Jallianwala Bagh massacre. He was succeeded as editor by his nephew, S. Rangaswami Iyengar.

During his tenure as managing-director, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar locked horns with V. Krishnaswami Iyer, Annie Besant and Sir Valentine Chirol, to whom he gave the rejoinder: "I am not here to learn journalistic etiquette from you," when the former made rude comments on the latter. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar also fought with governors Sir Arthur Lawley and Lord Pentland.

Iyengar's descendants now own The Hindu Group through their family's company, Kasturi & Sons. Ltd.