INDIA: Breaking Free: Battle over the Airwaves

["Frederick Noronha (FN)" <fred@bytesforall.org>]

			From Economic & Political Weekly
			www.epw.org.in

Breaking Free: Battle over the Airwaves
Vinod Pavarala

In February 2003, the small village of Orvakal in Kurnool district of Andhra
Pradesh off the Hyderabad-Bangalore highway had unwanted visitors from the
Communications Ministry of the Government of India.  The village that had
been the focus of development work by the UNDP for years had recently
launched an innovative experiment in community media called Mana Radio (Our
Radio).

Supported by the A.P. government's World Bank-funded poverty alleviation
programme, Velugu (meaning 'light', run under the aegis of the Society for
Elimination of Rural Poverty), this project used a tiny transmitter that
covered a radius of half a kilometer to enable rural women members of
self-help groups to communicate with each other and with other residents of
the village.  About four months after the programme was started amidst much
media excitement and participation by politicians, officials from the
Central government brought police to seize the equipment and declared the
broadcast illegal.  Under the archaic Indian Telegraph Act of 1885 and the
Wireless Act of 1933, they were of course legally right.

Paradoxically, around the same time, the Ministry of Information and
Broadcasting (MIB) announced policy guidelines for what it termed 'community
radio'.  According to the scheme, 'established' educational institutions,
such as universities, IITs, IIMs, and residential schools could obtain
licenses to run their own radio stations.  Mistakenly labeled 'community
radio', the norms laid down for licenses include content regulations that
suggest that these campus radio stations air programmes on agriculture,
environment, health, and other development-related information.  Apart from
the fact that university campuses are privileged 'communities' with more
than adequate access to media resources, it is unrealistic to expect campus
radio stations managed by young students to eschew fun and entertainment. 
There is no apparent fit between form and content in this new policy, even
as marginalized rural communities continue to be denied the right to
produce, own and operate real community radio.

Radio is an inexpensive medium -- both in terms of production and management
as well as for reception; it involves a fairly uncomplicated means of
production, making it easier for people to learn the techniques; it
overcomes the limitations of literacy; it is more appropriate for cultures
dominated by orality and helps enhance cultural identity and community
pride; the widespread ownership of and familiarity with transistor radios
make it potentially a people's medium; all over the Third World radio has a
proven track record of being a catalyst for social change.  It may be
possible for communities to use television and the Internet as well, but the
reasons stated above plus the inherent inequities built into these new
communication technologies render them less appropriate as substitutes.

Historically, radio has been used by the state within the context of an
older paradigm of community development as early as the 1950s.  That whole
approach was top-down, elitist, pedagogical, and treated people as only
passive consumers of information. However, 'community radio', in the sense
of a non-state, non-market venture, owned and managed by the community
(defined as a territorially bound group with some commonality of interests),
is a relatively recent idea in India. This idea is today being articulated
against the backdrop of the rise of new social movements and
non-governmental organizations. These movements and NGOs appeared on the
Indian socioeconomic canvas in the post-Emergency years, as the state
suffered from a severe crisis of legitimacy, giving rise to a civic ferment. 
These organizations have now, after two decades of grassroots work, reached
a level of maturity, redefining politics and development in the country. 
After years of focusing on issues of livelihood, capacity building and
mobilization, some of these organizations have now turned their attention to
deploying media technologies for empowerment of marginalized communities.

Even as the state-owned public service broadcaster, All India Radio, has
turned 75 and the Prasar Bharati Corporation has completed five years of its
existence, broadcasting in our country continues to be governed by archaic
laws and uncompromising bureaucracy. Apart from the inadequacy of the laws
governing electronic media in India, the state is also faced with a new set
of dilemmas and demands.  While private broadcasters are seeking a free
market for media and consumers are demanding the right to choose, a number
of civil society organizations are challenging the positions held and roles
played by state-centred or market-run media and are articulating the need
for alternatives in the form of popular, community-based media.

Several NGOs in the country have now developed an active interest in
community radio and some, in the absence of an independent license, have
been making use of available spaces within the state sector of broadcasting. 
Others, fearing cooptation and appropriation, have been steadfastly
resisting the offer to use state radio; they have, instead, continued to
creatively engage in narrowcasting.  The Government of India stubbornly
refuses to yield to the demands for opening up this sector, under misplaced
apprehensions that secessionists, militants or subversive elements would
misuse the medium. These so-called subversive elements do not need official
sanction to communicate with each other.  There are all kinds of simple as
well as more sophisticated mechanisms by which such groups bypass the
official communication routes.  This is just a bogey being raised by a
government that is uneasy about the consequences of democratization of the
airwaves.  The question we should ask is: why does this government find
Rupert Murdoch trustworthier than a poor, unlettered, Dalit woman who wants
to use a media channel to communicate?

This special section of EPW attempts to raise this and other critical
questions related to broadcasting in India, with specific reference to
community radio.  Fred Noronha provides an overview of developments in the
South Asian region, where many of India's neighbours have taken bigger
strides than India towards community radio.  Kanchan Kumar offers a
comprehensive historical analysis of broadcasting policy in India,
highlighting various government actions since independence caught between
autonomy and control.  The paper by Jo Tacchi examines community radio
policies in Australia and South Africa, hailed as one of the oldest and most
progressive, respectively, to suggest that state support in terms of
legislation and funding are imperative in the Indian context.  My paper is
based on an evaluation of Chala Ho Gaon Mein, the community radio project of
Alternative for India Development (AID) in Jharkhand, focusing on the
tangible and intangible benefits of the programme for the community. 
Finally, Ashish Sen makes an argument for carving out a legal space for
community radio in India by demonstrating the excitement generated by Namma
Dhwani (Our Voices), a collaborative community audio experiment by Voices
and Myrada in Karnataka.

[I would like to thank EPW and Padma Prakash for giving this space to
deliberate on the state of radio broadcasting in India and to share
experiences from the field of community radio.]

See www.mib.nic.in for detailed guidelines and application for license.