MUMBAI: Three of the top ten Hindi daily newspapers and an equal number out of the top ten English dailies saw a fall in readership in the third quarter of 2012. The Hindi newspapers which lost readership in the third quarter are Amar Ujala, Patrika and Nai Duniya), while the English dailies are The Telegraph, The Economic Times, and The New Indian Express.

These are the findings of the Indian Readership Survey (IRS) Q3 2012, released by the Media Research Users Council (MRUC) and Hansa Research.

Dainik Jagran continues to be the leader with all India readership (AIR) of 16.47 million in Q3 compared with 16.42 million in the preceding quarter. Dainik Bhaskar is in the second position with AIR of 14.5 million in the third quarter of calendar year 2012, up from 14.45 million in the preceding quarter.

The newspaper with the third largest all India readership is Hindustan. Its AIR increased to 12.24 million in Q3 from 12.20 million in the preceding quarter.

The pecking order of the publications has remained unchanged in the third quarter of 2012.

Malayala Manorama was the fourth most read publication with AIR of 9.75 million in Q3, up from 9.71 million in the preceding quarter.

Meanwhile, the AIR of Amar Ujala fell to 8.53 million in Q3 from 8.6 million in Q2 2012. The publication, however, remains the fifth most read.

Amongst Hindi language publication, Dainik Jagran, Dainik Bhaskar, Hindustan and Amar Ujala take the top four positions, respectively. They are followed by Rajasthan Patrika, AIR of which grew from 6.75 million in Q2 2012 to 6.8 million in Q3 2012.

In case of the English dailies, the Times of India maintained its position at the top of the list with AIR of 7.65 million in Q3 as compared to 7.64 in Q2 2012. It is followed by Hindustan Times (AIR: 3.768 million) and the Hindu (AIR 2.258 million). The pecking order here too remains the same as last quarter‘s.

The regional dailies saw some changes in the ranking order. Though Malayala Manorama continues to lead, Daily Thanthi with AIR of 7.41 million replaces Lokmat that witnessed AIR of 7.40 in the third quarter of 2012. Next in the ranking order is Mathrubhumi with AIR of 6.41 million. Seven out of the top ten Indian language dailies (Daily Thanthi, Lokmat, Mathrubhumi, Ananda Bazar Patrika, Gujarat Samachar, Dinakaran and Daily Sakal) lost readership.