What is a COMMUNITY RADIO ?
- Community radio is a radio service offering a third model of
radio broadcasting in
addition to commercial and public
broadcasting.
- Community
stations serve geographic communities and communities of interest.
- They broadcast
content that is popular and relevant to a local, specific audience but is
often overlooked by commercial or mass-media broadcasters.
- Community radio
stations are operated, owned, and influenced by the communities they
serve.
- They are
generally nonprofit and provide a mechanism for enabling individuals, groups, and
communities to tell their own stories, to share experiences and, in a
media-rich world, to become creators and contributors of media.
Why in news ?
The government will
facilitate the growth of community radio in the country to effectively convey
its messages to the poor and rural areas, Information and Broadcasting Minister
Arun Jaitley said on Friday (29 March, 2016).
Factual Data !
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- 191
community radio stations are currently working in INDIA and more than 400
new stations have been permitted (while a smaller nation like Nepal has
260 Community Radio Stations ! )
- Anna FM was
India's first campus "community" radio station. Launched on 1
February 2004, it is run by the Education and Multimedia Research Centre
(EM²RC); Anna university community radio pioneered by Dr. R Sreedher is a
shining example of a real community based radio in a campus. Programmes
are produced by students as well as community.
Benefits of Community Radio ?
- Community radio could play an
important role in dissemination of information about government schemes
and policies to the common people in local languages, which was not
possible through conventional mediums of mass communication as television.
- India is
a land of diversity in terms of language, social practices, dialects and
culture, a community radio can be a powerful tool to revive culture and
languages that are dying.
- It can
help give voice to the voiceless
in the backward community.
Some examples of Community Radio
Stations and how they can help in welfare of the people !
· NGO will launch a
community radio for the fisher community in Rameswaram. The NGO, Nesakarangal
Trust, plans to launch the community radio -- Kadalosai 90.4 FM -- on April 14.
It would be a typical FM
radio packed with lifesaving information and entertainment.The NGO, which works
among fishermen, has obtained licence from the central government to launch the
community radio.The radio station will be manned by local youth from fishermen
community with a couple of volunteers being trained by experts.The content of
the programme will include both entertainment as well as vital information for
fishing community -- weather, fish movement, state and central government
schemes to fishermen community, job opportunities and entrepreneurship
guidance.The community radio will also broadcast programmes on marine ecology
of the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait sensitising farmers about the
endangered marine species, conservation effects.Weather forecast might change
suddenly and there will be no way of getting the information. Radio is useful
tool in such case. Moreover, when a fishing boat strands mid-sea and fails to
return shore, SOS could be sent via radio station to other boats in the
vicinity
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- Community Radio in a
Rajasthan Village Is Using the Internet to Empower 50,000 Lives
Every morning at 7 am, about
40,000-60,000 people in and around the village of Tilonia in Ajmer district of
Rajasthan, turn on their radio transistors and tune into 90.4 FM to listen to
Norat Mal and Aarti Devi’s broadcast.The village’s relationship with Tilonia
Radio started on November 9, 2009, when Norat, who belongs to Tilonia, was helped
by frugal community radio expert Raghav Mahto and four other men and women from
Tilonia in setting up a makeshift broadcasting studio in Barefoot College’s
Tilonia Craft shop.
The idea to set up a
community radio station was suggested by Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan founder
Aruna Roy and late journalist Ajit Bhattacharya, and its set up was facilitated
by Digital Empowerment Foundation Founder-Director Osama Manzar. The thought
behind setting up the station was to share the rich collection of audio/visual
archive and social message-driven puppetry with a wider population that was not
just restricted to Tilonia.
Most recently, on January
12, 2016, a special event was organised in which several activists were invited
to talk about pension, ration and NREGA. The event was part of an upcoming
30-episode broadcast series called Ab Ki Baar Mera
Adhikaar.’
Facebook is a platform where harbingers of
community radio have formed a community of their own. There are dedicated pages
for various community radio stations that share content they have broadcast. If
their content is applicable or useful for another region, it is picked up by
the respective community radio stations. There is also a document on Google
Drive where everyone can share open content. In this way, community radio
stations get to share content with each other, which would otherwise not have
been possible, and also create a larger sense of community. The community radio
content that was otherwise available for a population within the 15 km radius
becomes available and useful for people across the country through the
Internet.
RADIO MEWAT !!
Radio Mewat was launched
on September 1, 2010, in Nuh, Haryana, by an NGO-Seeking Modern Applications
for Real Transmission (SMART). It broadcasts four hours a day and reaches
out to over five lakh people in a radius of 25 kilometres.
Mewat is a backward area, faring very low on all social indicators, with the literacy rate at an abysmal low of 24 per cent. Only 5 per cent households have a television set. Educating people about the very concept of a Community Radio was a Herculean task. Station has a tough job popularizing the radio station in a district where elders are suspicious of any new idea and are very protective towards their women folk. Also, there are power outages for days together. Morover being in the interiors, it is difficult to get experienced people to work on a regular basis.
The biggest success of
Radio Mewat has been in the revival of the dying art form of ‘Mirasi’.
Mewat is well known for its Mirasis, the Muslim folk signers who can narrate
epics like the Mahabharata. These Mirasis are the symbols of religious
tolerance.
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The
main issues which stand as a hindrance to setting up of a community radio
station ?
1) Funding
2) Programming
3) Technology
4) License renewal
2) Programming
3) Technology
4) License renewal
Issue of
Funding
- lack of adequate funding
appears to be a huge threat to the existence of these stations. Most of
these stations are run by NGOs and Not-for-Profit organisations, relying
heavily on government support.
- The lack of local ads too has
a lot to do with programming on CRS. The community radio stations are only
allowed to play local folk music and talk about issues in their region.
They cannot air news or play the usual Bollywood numbers like the FM
stations.
- Government funds the stations
only when the air what they are asked to. They are expected to air the
prime minister’s address, ‘Mann Ki Baat’ and various other government
programmes. If they don’t air these, they wouldn’t be funded. And local
advertisers won’t advertise on these stations because the reach is
limited.
Issue of
Technology
- A CRS is allowed a 50-watt
power transmitter at the moment, but these transmitters work differently
for CRS in different regions. In a hilly terrain, the 50-watt transmitter
may not work as well it would in the plains where there are no
obstructions.
- In some places, the villages
too are at a huge distance from each other. In such cases, one would need
more power to reach out to the villages. The government needs to consider
these points.
Issue of
tedious process
- The CRS owners have to also
go through a tedious renewal process, allege those running them. As per
I&B Ministry website www.mib.nic.in there are 188 operational CRS in India while, they
have received 1806 applications. The 188 stations include a lot of pending
renewals. There are major issues like renewal of licensing that need to be
discussed, but they are usually pushed under the carpet.
