|
By Elisa Patnaik The villagers of Budikote in Karnataka are making and narrowcasting their own cable radio programmes on issues of local interest. Thirty-five neighbouring villages also tune in to the cable radio network for two hours everyday. With legislation on community radio broadcasting still a long way off in India, cable radio could be the best way forward
Thirty eight-year-old Triveni from Budikote, an obscure village in Karnataka's Kolar district, likes to be updated on all the latest news. Her knowledge of recent happenings, common health problems andhousehold remedies is remarkable, considering that she is illiterate. But thanks to Namma Dhwani (Our Voices), India's first community cable radio network, many like Triveni in Budikote, 100 km from Bangalore, are able to access information, express their problems and needs and seek results.
At present 250 houses with television sets are being benefited by Namma Dhwani and the cable costs are not too taxing at Rs 50 a month. Moreover, 35 villages neighbouring Budikote also get to listen to these programmes and voice their opinions and problems since they are narrowcast for them. More than 350 programmes have been made so far for the network ranging from agriculture, irrigation, health, environment, self-help groups, women and youth, news and other social issues. The community radio project works in tandem with two non-profit organisations, VOICES, a Bangalore-based development communication unit working for marginalised sections of society, and MYRADA (Mysore Development And Rural Development Agency), which has been working in the area for nearly a decade. “I want to be like Bhavani akka,” says a smiling 13-year-old Anita, a student of Class 8 in the village. It's not only Anita; many children in Budikote look up to 21-year-old Bhavani, a volunteer for the community radio centre. Bhavani's active participation in Namma Dhwani, has made her brim with confidence. “I still remember the time when I was unable to speak a word in public and now I love participating in live radio programmes,” she smiles. To prepare for the task, she reads four newspapers, participates in self-help group meetings and uses the computer to access information. Bhavani and 29 other volunteers in Namma Dhwani have awakened Budikote with their radio programming. Now the 3,000 residents of the village are fully involved in what's being broadcast from their radios. The volunteers are permitted to present shows on any subject for which technical and research-based support is provided to them. Besides important information, there's plenty of local-flavour entertainment too, such as live debates on current issues, folk songs, dramas and children's programmes. Bhavani also works at the Community Resource Centre, which acts as the perfect link between government departments and the village. The Centre is also a database-cum-knowledge bank for 35 adjoining villages. Every day over 30 men and women walk in to access information – from vegetable market prices to news about disability welfare schemes. “The Centre's computer now has a database of more than 500 folk songs, folktales of yore and information on indigenous medicine systems,” says a proud Balakrishna, manager of the resource centre. Attempts have also been made to revive the region's local culture through folk songs and folklore. Though the resource centre has been functioning in the village for the last 10 years, it's the community radio today that has broadcast the information loud and clear.
After school, the youngsters in Budikote prefer to spend their evenings at the resource centre, picking up skills in computer applications and software training. This UNESCO-funded computer centre now boasts 30 students and a batch of 25 has already passed out last year, of which some are employed at the resource centre itself. Twenty-two-year-old Rajkumar was one of the first few to be trained at the centre. Now he is part of the centre's resource team and trains a bunch of young enthusiasts like Kesavamurthy, Radha and Mamta. And this is no mean achievement considering that Budikote has power failures for nearly 14 hours every day. The students' favourite software is Baraha, which helps people translate documents from Kannada to English and vice versa. The centre has plans to develop a radio-browsing programme for villagers to keep abreast of the latest developments across the globe. A small-scale version of Namma Dhwani was launched in the village in 2001, when programmes addressing the needs of the community were recorded on cassettes and played at local gatherings like the weekly market and fairs. However, the audience was limited to Budikote even after two years of operation. “VOICES and MYRADA began work in Budikote with a needs assessment study, the findings of which revealed that the community wanted an information centre, which would give them timely and locally relevant information through audio, a medium they were comfortable with,” says director of VOICES Ashish Sen. With this in mind they began a spate of training sessions on programming techniques conducted by experts from AIR, following which volunteers began to make programmes on topics such as sericulture, organic farming techniques, child and reproductive health, insurance etc. What was now needed was an outlet to get people to listen and respond to these programmes. “This is when we started narrowcasting at self-help group meetings. We extended this network of narrowcasting to 60 SHGs belonging to 35 villages in the Budikote sector. This system worked well because the SHG mainly consists of women members from poor families, with limited access to crucial information," explains Sen.With technical and financial assistance from AIR and UNESCO, VOICES and MYRADA contacted a local cable operator who agreed to broadcast the programmes. Now the residents of Budikote listen to two hours of daily programming based on a range of issues. The managing committee of Namma Dhwani epitomises the philosophy of the audio station. The committee comprises 26 members who represent their SHGs, the staff and volunteers of Namma Dhwani and representatives of MYRADA and VOICES and meets every 5th and 25th of the month to evaluate programming, provide feedback and discuss management issues. "We established an audio cable connection to the standard ten classroom of the high school of Budikote in July 2002. With the co-operation of the Block Education Officer, staff, parents and children, the students now tune in to two hours of programming every week," says Mangamma, a member of the committee. The programmes consist of newspaper reading, local news, general knowledge, music, model lessons, and issues like dowry, environment preservation etc. "As a result of this we now have a children's club called Hosa Belaku (New Light), with about 60 children from Budikote and the neighboring villages," she adds. The children dabble in drama, poetry and music and are fast learning audio production techniques. Parallel to the cable audio project, is the school audio project. Twice a week, educational programmes, often made by the students themselves, are cablecast to the senior classes at Budikote's only school. The subjects covered include current affairs, local news, music, drama, general knowledge etc, in addition to material pertinent to the school curriculum. Officials in Budikote do not turn a deaf ear to people's pleas any longer. The Panchayat secretary of Budikote, for example, was not taking any action to solve the water shortage problem in the village and on being interviewed by Namma Dhwani, he simply repeated his promises. However, he was compelled to keep his promise within a week because the entire community had heard his assurances on the radio and demanded action. Another success of the project is the establishment of a club for the physically and mentally challenged that spreads awareness about opportunities and schemes for the disabled. The studio at Namma Dhwani makes programmes on agriculture, health, indigenous medicine, devotional songs, cookery, live debates, widow pension, government schemes and entertainment. Three studio managers -- Nagaraj, Mangala Gauri and Amrish -- decide on the programmes and several volunteers help them. "We broadcast in Kannada and Telugu for two hours a day in the mornings and evenings. We put up the daily schedule on the notice board outside the studio to help the SHG members," says Mangala. Besides the daily news and other programmes, members of SHGs read out their accounts. " It won't be too long before all the houses in the village tune in on their radios and TVs to their own cable radio station, their own voices," says Seema Nair, coordinator of the project."The remaining 450 households will also be cabled. Since these households do not own television sets, they will receive the cable channel on modified radio sets, which are being sold to them at a subsidised rate of Rs 125," she informs. With legislation on traditional community radio projects still a long way off in India, community cable radio networks like the one in Budikote seem to be the only viable alternative. (Elisa Patnaik is a Bhubaneswar-based journalist.) InfoChange News & Features, November 2003
|
