The presentation will enhance the knowledge in the development of FM Radio in India. It also gives the full picture about the public and private broadcasters in FM sector in India

1. FM RADIO IN INDIA
Dr. J. JANARDHAN

2. FM BROADCASTING

3. FM BROADCASTING
 In 1977, Frequency Modulation broadcasting was introduced in
Madras
 Later at Jalandhar in 1992
 On 15th Aug, 1993, FM channel was launched in Bombay
 In 1993, time slots started to be leased to private companies
 Then FM becomes synonymous with pop music and youth culture

4. FM BROADCASTING
 With nine hours of Radio time leased to Times FM, Radio Star
& Radio Midday.
 Music video Channels like –V, MTV were launched
 FM broadcast ensured reception free from atmospheric noise
 The AIR stations of Delhi, Bombay, Panaji, Bangalore, Madras
& Calcutta sold FM slots to private

5. FM BROADCASTING
 AIR charged a fee of Rs. 3000/- per hour
 But, Private companies charged advertisers Rs. 250-300 for ten
seconds commercials.
 Urban English-speaking youth were the targeted listeners
 Western pop-music dominated
 FM programmes includes Chat shows, Contests and Quizzes
 Phone-ins, Page-ins and Write-ins were the strategies used to
involve listeners

6. FM BROADCASTING
 It became new mass medium for urban India
 FM technology facilitates localization of broadcasting
New York-82 stations
London- 42 stations
Manila-35
Jakarta-29
India-5
 Until 2000, Private broadcaster (ToI, Midday) to hold on their
monopoly
 Transmission bands for FM radio -80-108 Mhz

7. FM AIRWAVES
 AIR has extended FM broadcasting to many India cities
 In 1995, the S.C. pronounced that ‘the airwaves are public
property’
 It ‘couldn’t be monopoly’ of either government or business
 The government privatize the airwaves
 The monopoly of AIR ended in 1999 with private commercial FM
radio channels
 In 2001, 108 FM radio licenses were sanctioned for 40 cities
 ToI group was the largest winner of 10 years license

8. FM AIRWAVES
 In early 2006 as many as 338 licenses for FM stations in 91 cities
were auctioned off
 All the private companies were allowed to get up to 20% FDIs
 The second phase (2007) saw the auction of 97 stations to 27
companies
 It led the establishing of FM stations in small cities like Bikaner,
Trichy, Udaipur, Agartala, Gangtok & Warangal
 This phase ushered in the revenue share model
 ToI, Living Media, Hindustan Times, Dainik bhaskar, Jagran
Prakashan, Midday, Zee TV, Star, Sun an Eenadu have gained

9. FM AIRWAVES
 By the end of 2007, FM radio industry was worth over Rs. 310 cr.
 BIG FM, Survan, Radio Mirchi, Radio City and AIR’s FM( Rainbow
FM & FM gold) were the main players
Jagaran Prakashan Radio Mantra
Midday Radio One
Hindustan Times Radio Fever
ToI Radio Mirchi
India Today Radio Today/ Meow
Dainik Bhaskar My FM
Dinakaran Suryan FM/ ‘S’ FM
Malayala Manorama Manorama Radio/Mango
Anand Bazar Patrika Friends FM
Pudhari Publications Tamato FM
Prabhat Khabbar Radio Dhoom

10. FM AIRWAVES
 Music, Chat, News, Current affairs and live sports commentaries
were allowed
 Since 2007, FM receivers were raised to 78 million
 The composition of typical radio hours
Music 67%
Advt. 14%
R.J. talk 09%
Promotions 05%
Fillers 04%
Others 01

11. GROWTH OF RADIO INDUSTRY
 Radio has the widest reach & coverage
 With 132 million radio sets & reach to almost entire population
 The coverage of AIR’s FM stations about 31%
 Private FM stations a bare 9 %
 NGOs & small communities have succeeded in ‘Community Radio’
 It relates to non-state & non profit narrow casting
 50% programmes were made by local communities
 In early 2006, Raghav ( Bihar) ran community radio station
 He forced him to shut the station
 He had no training & spent Rs. 50/- to put his station

12. GROWTH OF RADIO INDUSTRY
 The BBC called Raghav’s FM was amazing
 Some of the Community Radio stations Radio Ujjas (Gujarat)
DDS- in Pastapur (AP), Namma Dhawani in Karnataka, Radio
Alakal in Trivandrum etc,
 Some social activities in Bangalore in 1996 to started
‘Bangalore Declaration’
 In 2002, Govt. opened up FM radio to Community groups
and to universities

13. GROWTH OF RADIO INDUSTRY
 17 campus radios such as Jamia Milia Islamia, IGNOU,
Annamalai, Pune, FTII, IIMC, HCU and so on are functioning
 End of 2007, 26 community radio stations were on the air
 In 2006, Govt. announced a new policy
 It opened up FM licensing to Civil Societies, NGOs,
Autonomous, Registered societies
 But, for individuals, Political parties, profit making institutions
were prohibited
 No license fee was required for community radio

14. DIGITAL AUDIO BROADCASTING
 Mid 1990s, Several broadcaster including AIR started DAB
 DAB was arose by European project called Eureka-147
 It was launched by BBC in 1995 in London
 It transmits sound as computer code rather than as analogue waves
 It provides interference-free sound
 DAB can also carry multimedia services such as Text, Data files,
Graphics, pictures and moving videos
 DAB listeners can enjoy programmes accompanied by information
and pictures on the computers

15. SATELLITE RADIO
 World space is the only private satellite radio platform working
in India
 It has the headquarters in Washington D.C.
 It was launched in 2000 with free to air
 Later, it became a pay service, Offering over 40 radio channels in
several Indian languages
 It has variety of genres, Jazz, Classical, Old Hindi film music &
Rock
 It is unaffordable business plan, requires special radio receivers

16. VISUAL RADIO
 It is convergent technology
 Combination of FM radio with Mobile phones
 Radio built into mobile devices
 Visual radio shows you what is playing on the phone screen
 Listeners pay only for the data service carried via General Packet
Radio Service
 India is the third country in the world to offer Visual Radio
 It provides rich textual and visual information
 www.myspace.com, www.secondlife.com, www.flickr.com were part of
this services

17. INTERNET RADIO
 Several public & commercial radio stations transmit their music and
talk shows on the Internet
 Most Indian FM channels have an active presence
 Hindi film music dominates on these desi-radio sites

18. BROADCASTING ETHICS
 Ethics of broadcasting is very similar to those for the print media
 Those are accuracy, fairness, respect for privacy/religious beliefs
 Respect the practices of different communities
 Need for caution in reporting violence/ communal disturbances
 Need to follow the caution in Criticizing Judicial acts
 Respect for the confidentiality of sources
 Need to avoid obscenity and vulgarity

19. THANK YOU