Singing the news
When Radio Sagarmatha was set up by the Nepal Forum of Environmental Journalists (Nefej) in May 1997 it became the first Community Radio Station in South Asia to commence transmission. There are stories of how they overcame the monarchist government’s proscription of news broadcasts for a while by singing the news and passing it off as music programmes!
‘Sangham Radio’, India’s first community radio station, celebrated its first anniversary on 15 October, 2009. For those of us who were unable to share the moment with General Algole, PV Satheesh and the women of Pastapur, here’s a report from today’s Deccan Herald.
“Radioing friends over airwaves”
R Akhileshwari, Deccan Herald, 1 Nov 2009
The amphitheatre in Machnoor village of Zaheerabad mandal in Medak district was recently buzzing with women who had turned out in their finery: wearing brightly coloured, inexpensive but new sarees and their traditional necklace of ‘gundlu’ and ear-rings called ‘genteelu’ with flowers in their hair, the women of nearby villages turned out for an occasion that was as historic as their own. Their ‘Sangam Radio’ had turned all of one year. Sangam Radio is India’s first community radio, entirely owned and run by members of women’s groups or Sangams as they are known. These Sangams are supported by the Deccan Development Society that has been working for the poorest, landless, Dalit women of Zaheerabad for the past 25 years helping them reclaim their lives from the relentless forces of globalisation. This was achieved through regaining their control over food production, seeds, natural resources and management, the market and finally over the media. Setting up the community radio was part of the efforts to shake off the grip of a centralised media that alienates the communities from their own roots that lie in their culture, traditions and language. Most importantly, the radio became the voice of the community as it highlights problems which afflict their crops, livestock and families as also the solutions that are thrashed out on air and solutions shared. As Bidekanne Sammamma said: “Our radio is our friend. When we come home after a day’s hard work our minds are full of problems we switch on our radio and are revived..with the radio by my side I feel my dost is there at home,’’ she said. Sangam Radio had its beginnings in the idea that the media should be an expression of the community, articulated in its own language unique to the region; that it should be a mirror of their identities and traditions; that it should be a platform for day-to-day problems and issues of their lives and livelihoods; it should be an outlet of their joys and woes, of their creativity, of their music and songs, of their crops and food. The idea was to reaffirm their strengths rather than be swamped by an alien media propagating an alien culture. It was to take pride in them rather than be persuaded by a media that they were somehow lesser beings for being themselves. Sangam Radio started in 1998 with UNESCO’s help. Half a dozen women from Dalit, poor, landless families were trained in all aspects of radio programming. They produced a few hundred hours of programming and since the stiff rules of broadcasting would not be relaxed, Sangam Radio ‘narrowcast’ their programmes, playing the tapes in the weekly meetings of the Sangam. However following the revolutionary judgement of Justice P B Sawant in the Supreme Court that airwaves were public property, Sangam Radio went on air on October 15, 2008. It is on air daily between 7 and 9 pm. The programme content is a mix of interviews, discussions, songs, folk tales and plays. According to a study, 80 per cent of the participants are women and Dalits. Elders are particularly encouraged to participate as they are seen as valuable repositories of knowledge. Sangam Radio has discarded the traditional top-down development approach and focuses on creating awareness in the community, based on the premise that critical information will trickle down and they will absorb information important to them. Instead the participatory approach has been adopted where the community makes the decisions about what is important to their lives. Importantly, the community owns the radio. Out of the 5000 women members of the Sangam (that are active in about 75 villages), at least 2000 are ‘active’ members, each contributing Rs 5 per month which takes care of the expenses of the radio station and its staff. Thus, the community ensures that the radio like the mainstream media does not depend on advertising which comes with its own set of strings attached. This model of community shareholding is unique in the country and which apart from financial sustainability, ensures social sustainability with a strong sense of ownership and identification of the community with the Radio. Another unique feature of the Sangam radio station is that the community members are not mere listeners but active participants. The radio station keeps its doors open for people to come and record their talk, songs or share their problems or knowledge. This promotes not just informality but a sense of belonging like we don’t need to take an appointment to get into our home! People from different villages are encouraged to visit the station once a month to take part in various programmes. Sangam Radio is not just an experiment but a valuable lesson on democratisation of the media and a huge step towards demystifying it!
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/33475/radioing-friends-over-airwaves.html _______________________________________________
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One of our speakers at the Workshop: The all womens’ radio – Radio Sangham
 Date:20/11/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/11/20/stories/2006112003722000.ht
Dalit women set to air programmes By K. Venkateshwarlu
— PHOTO: K. RAMESH BABU  TUNING IN: `General’ Narsamma at the Deccan Development Society Community FM Radio Centre at Machnoor. MACHNOOR (Medak district): A quartet of Dalit women, sing “jagadam pata”, a song on a fight between a local landlord and a Dalit tenant, which unfolded in their village of Machnoor. In the adjoining room of the domed studio, `General’ Narsamma moves the knob on a mixer, occasionally helped by Algolu Narsamma.These Dalit women are all set to broadcast their hour-long programme from the country’s first full- fledged Community Radio Station set up here by a non-governmental organisation, Deccan Development Society (DDS). The Union Cabinet cleared the proposal to licence them on November 16. There are at least three such community radios set up but all of them depend on AIR for broadcasting.But for the licence, everything was in place with UNESCO providing part of the funds.The studio building was made with locally available low cost material, two 16 and 4 channel mixers and stereo recorders, two 100-watt FM transmitters with a coverage area of 30 km radius reaching out to 100 villages, were already set up.”Licence for the community radio was denied all these years citing security reasons. Now that the policy got the Cabinet nod we are immensely happy. It will herald democratisation of India’s airwaves. People’s radio has become a reality”, said P. V. Satheesh, Director of DDS. “It bridges the gap as mainstream media has no space for them”, observed Vinod Pavarala, Dean of Communication, University of Hyderabad. Making radio programmes has been a child’s play for these tape-recorder wielding Dalit women, as they have canned 500 hours of them so far. “It’s our radio and we will broadcast programmes made by us for our benefit. We will talk about seeds, crop diversity, organic farming, health, hygiene, women’s problems and sending children to school, virtually everything that touches the community,” said `General’ Narsamma brimming with confidence. There is expectation that the radio tailored to community needs would not only lend voice to the voiceless marginalised community but revive interest in the dying oral folk traditions like “Bichapola patalu.”
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Community Radio Workshop
Date:November 27 & 28
For registration and further details contact:
Pooja/Sandeep-022-23826674/022-23869052
Schedule for the Seminar
Day 1: 27 Nov 2009
DAY 2: 28 November, 2009
Comet holds a workshop to initiate Community Radio efforts in Western India with the collaboration of MICCI & FES
We can say that the Community Radio movement in India took birth with the 1995 Supreme Court judgement “Airwaves constitute public property and must be utilised for advancing the public good.” In the years since, government has, in discussion with proponents of Community Radio, shaped a Community Radio Policy.
At November end in Mumbai, we will be re-visiting this terrain and finding out how community based groups and educational bodies can apply and get licenses to set up Community Radio Stations.
Until now, the mention of the word radio would bring two contrasting images to mind, one would be the droning educational programmes of AIR FM, and the other is the ceaseless, ebullient banter of the cult of the radio jockeys of commercial FM stations – where content and music are only incidental to radio programming. In this duality of the past and the present, there is a third category that is little known and to be sure, little ‘heard’ of. This is the phenomenon of the Community Radio. But what is Community Radio?
Community Radio is not just about broadcast content, it is more about the process of community engagement. It is about ordinary people having a presence in the media landscape, seeking support for their views and becoming responsible for their own content. Community Radio is also about the process of developing a critical view of media by making media yourself. At the practical level, CR is a medium which is affordable, readily available and portable enough to fulfill the needs of listeners. It stands for community ownership and control, community participation and is non profit in nature.
In India, radio has been in the hands of the state ever since its inception. However, by the 1970s and 80s, with the attention of the government turning to television, radio had become a neglected medium, with AIR languishing in the shadows. A change came in 1995 when AIR launched FM broadcasts and allowed private producers to take slots on sponsorship basis.
After a long-drawn series of negotiations between government and interested individuals and groups responding to the 1995 Supreme Court judgement, a set of Community Radio Guidelines, limited to educational institutions, was announced in 2003. Its scope was later expanded to include civil society organisations as the Community Radio Policy of 2006. According to the CR Policy, the government can issue a maximum of 4000 Radio Station (CRS) licenses in India. However, there have been less than 300 applications and as of October 2009, only 57 had actually got licenses in hand for starting their CRSs. It’s time for those with public communication on their agenda to wake up to this hard-won advantage.
So tune in for regular updates on speakers, participants and other info about the workshop.
Comet, MICCI & FES organise a Community Radio Workshop
Come November, the Community Radio Wave that had begun with PB Sawant’s historic judgment about airwaves, will get a breath of fresh air when Comet in collaboration with MICCI and FES organise a CR workshop.
Until now, the mention of the word radio would bring two contrasting images to mind, one would be the droning educational programmes of AIR FM, and the other is the ceaseless, ebullient banter of the cult of the radio jockeys of commercial FM stations – where content and music are only incidental to radio programming. In this duality of the past and the present, there is a third category that is little known and to be sure, little ‘heard’ of. This is the phenomenon of the Community Radio. But what is Community Radio?
Community Radio is not just about broadcast content, it is more about the process of community engagement. It is about ordinary people having a presence in the media landscape, seeking support for their views and becoming responsible for their own content. Community Radio is also about the process of developing a critical view of media by making media yourself. At the practical level, CR is a medium which is affordable, readily available and portable enough to fulfill the needs of listeners. It stands for community ownership and control, community participation and is non profit in nature.
In India, radio has been in the hands of the state ever since its inception. However, by the 1970s and 80s, with the attention of the government turning to television, radio had become a neglected medium, with AIR languishing in the shadows. A change came in 1995 when AIR launched FM broadcasts and allowed private producers to take slots on sponsorship basis.
After a long-drawn series of negotiations between government and interested individuals and groups responding to the 1995 Supreme Court judgement, a set of Community Radio Guidelines, limited to educational institutions, was announced in 2003. Its scope was later expanded to include civil society organisations as the Community Radio Policy of 2006. According to the CR Policy, the government can issue a maximum of 4000 Radio Station (CRS) licenses in India. However, there have been less than 300 applications and as of October 2009, only 57 had actually got licenses in hand for starting their CRSs. It’s time for those with public communication on their agenda to wake up to this hard-won advantage.
So tune in for regular updates on the status, information, speakers, participants in the workshop.
Hello world!
Speaking at an international consultation on Community Radio in 2007, the Information & Broadcasting secretary of India said that up to 4000 CR stations could be operating within a year or two! But over two years down the line, there have been under 400 applications of which less than sixty have received a broadcast licence, Of these, only a handful gone on the air.
Can we help the CR movement in India take off? All would-be broadcasters in the public interest are welcome!
