The document discusses the evolution of radio content in India from pre-independence to the present digital age. It traces the origins and development of radio in India, from amateur stations used by freedom fighters, to the establishment of All India Radio in 1927. It describes how radio was initially used only for political purposes and national integration, but later diversified to include entertainment, commercials, and catering to regional audiences. Modern developments have included the growth of private FM stations since the 1990s, digital technologies like internet radio and podcasts, and more informal and interactive content and communication styles.

1. RADIO CONTENT IN DIGITAL AGE

2. DIFFERENCE IN RADIO CONTENT FROM PRIOR TO INDEPENDENCE TO NOW Content Genre Modes/Channels Format/Type of Programmes Audience for radio Techniques

3. CHANGE IN CONTENT To discuss the change in Radio Content lets first discuss the origin and evolution of radio in India right from Prior to Independence to today. Simultaneously we will be able to study how the position and content of radio kept on changing.

4. ORIGIN OF RADIO IN INDIA Establishment of the first licensed amateur radio in 1921 Role of radio in Indian Independence Illegal pro-independence radio stations in 1940’s Advent of AIR Advent of Private Radio FM Channels

5. PRIOR TO INDEPENDENCE Prior to independence, Amateur radio was used by the freedom fighters to broadcast uncensored information to common man. Several got arrested and their license was shut. They used it for exchange of information. Congress activists use it to exchange information with the grass root workers in Mumbai. It was called as Azad Hind Radio. Subhash Chandra Bose while broadcasting on it use to call it Anti Indian Radio. Radio played a great role even during independence. It helped to deliver important announcements and speeches in the form of news. So the content of the radio was only for political purpose since independence was the most prime issue then. There were no commercials and no entertainment.

6. The first broadcasting Service began in 1927 in Mumbai and Kolkata called as Indian State Broadcasting Company Ltd. In 1930 this company got bankrupted and it constituted under Department of ‘Controller of Broadcasts’. Later in June, 1936 it was renamed as ‘All India Radio’ or ‘Akashwani’ and Commercials became a part of all the other radio programmes. Akashwani is a government-owned, semi -commercial operation of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Along with Commercials, classical music also got its existence among the programmes. Now classical music was also broadcasted. So All India Radio came up with objective to inform, educate about the political, economic and social development and entertain the mass.

7. ALL INDIA RADIO AFTER INDEPENDENCE When India attained Independence in 1947, AIR had a network of six stations and 18 transmitters. The coverage was 2.5 % of the area and just 11% of the population. Congress Govt. headed by Jawaharlal Nehru had three major goals-political integration, economic development and social modernization. So all the National affairs and social changes were informed to the mass through Radio. Indian Radio took birth and was promoted by the government at its best for the objective of political nation building. National integration and the development of a "national consciousness" happened to be the primary objective of All India Radio.

8. In 1957 All India Radio came up with a new Commercial radio service called as “Vividh Bharti” with its headquarters at Mumbai. The motive behind the launching of this Commercial service was: a.) earn revenues through extensive advertisement b.) Akashwani use to play only classical music which was meant for a particular class of people. It didn’t gave space to the songs of Bollywood Movies which was in more demand. Radio Ceylon was the only foreign radio channel which provided this facility. So Vividh Bharti was the need to entertain all sections of mass with Hindi movie songs. Vividh Bharti started broadcasting its programmes mainly from Mumbai and Chennai. These two cities were selected for geographical reasons. The service provide d entertainment for nearly 15 to 17 hours a day. It presents a mix of film music, skits, short plays and interactive programmes.

9. Programmes broadcasted were talk shows, interviews, phone to viewers and health and hygiene related shows, agricultural programmes and rural development. Some of the old popular programmes of Vividh Bharati are 'S angeet Sargam ', 'B hule B isre G eet ', ‘ Hawa M ahal ', 'J aimala ', 'I nse M iliye ', ‘C hhaya G eet ' ETC., are still distinctly recongnised by the listeners. From time to time new programmes were introduced like ‘B iscope K e B atein ', ‘S argam K e S itare ', ‘C elluloid K e S itare ', ‘S ehatnama ', &' H ello F armaish '. 40 Vividh Bharati stations across the country down-linked these programmes through captive earth stations provided at each of these AIR stations . Some local programme windows are also provided at these stations to give regional flavour to the listeners. These 40 Vividh Bharati stations are known as Vigyapan Prasaran Seva ,the Commercial Broadcasting Service Stations and are located at all major and commercially vibrant cities covering 97% of the Indian population . With the advent of new technology the transmission of programmes gradually migrated from earlier medium wave transmission to high quality digital stereo FM. Commercials were introduced initially in the Vividh Bharati Service in the year 1967 on an experimental basis.

10. STATUS OF RADIO BROADCASTING AFTER 1990 Emergence of Prasar Bharati : The Parliament of India passed an Act to grant this autonomy in 1990, but it was not enacted until September 15,1997.It was an autonomous body of Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India comprising of Doordarshan Television Network and All India Radio. Advent of FM Radio Channels : In the mid-nineties, when India first experimented with private FM broadcasts , the small tourist Destination of Goa was the fifth place in this country of one billion where private players got FM slots. The other four centres were the big metro cities: Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai. These were followed by stations in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Jaipur and Lucknow. Listenership has increased in certain urban areas due to the time allotment of the private FM radio channel. Film and other popular music constituted the main curriculum of such stations contributing to an increase in commercial time and thus earn advertising revenues from Rs. 527 million in 1992 to Rs.809 million in 1996.

11. News in not permitted on private FM, although the federal minister says this may be reconsidered in two to three years. Nationally, many of the current FM players, including the Times of India, Hindustan Times, Mid-Day, and BBC are essentially newspaper chains or media, and they are already making a strong pitch for news on FM. All India Radio also got converted itself to FM and launched two more FM channels in Kolkata namely 107FM Rainbow and 100.2FM Gold. News-on-phone service- All India Radio, after launching the news-on-phone service on 25 February 1998 from New Delhi, is running the service from Chennai, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Patna and Bangalore also. The service is accessible through STD, ISD and local telephone calls. The service is going to be started from 9 more cities — Ahmadabad, Guwahati, Imphal, Jaipur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Raipur, Simla and Thiruvanthapuram shortly.

12. CHANGE IN THE CONTENT OF RADIO WITH CHANGE IN TECHNOLOGY

13. 21 ST CENTURY DEVELOPMENT Internet Radio: It consists of sending radio-style audio programming over streaming Internet connections. No radio transmitters need be involved at any point in the process. AIR also launched its online radio service from January 2009. Digital Audio Broadcasting: It is a digital radio technology for broadcasting radio stations, used in several countries including India. Traditionally radio programmes were broadcast on different frequencies via FM and AM, and the radio had to be tuned into each frequency. This used up a comparatively large amount of spectrum for a relatively small number of stations, limiting listening choice. DAB is a digital radio broadcasting system that through the application of multiplexing and compression combines multiple audio streams onto a single broadcast frequency called a DAB ensemble. Online Music Services: Online music services usually offers millions of songs and thousands of artists for users to choose from. Network music player that supports online music services lets user access this vast selection of music tracks. Examples of online music services : Napster, Rhapsody (online music service), Last.fm, Pandora (music service), Radio Time, Live365.

14. Podcasts: A podcast is a series of digital media files, either audio or video, that is released episodically and downloaded through web syndication. So now Radio was not only a medium of audio entertainment. There were several other sources too. Though it is at a very nascent stage, despite the fact that a large number of people blog from the nation yet it has a bright future since it works quite well in other nations.

15. DIFFERENCE IN GENRE, LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION PROCESS OF RADIO PROGRAMMES Previously genre of radio programmes was information and educational based. Radio believed in traditional forms because of which only classical music was played for entertainment prior to independence. But today the taste of people has changed a lot and radio is more than a tool used for dissemination of information. Today the word that dominates in radio is “Infotainment” i.e.; information as well as entertainment. With the upcoming of Private FM radio channels whose genre was totally different from All India Radio and was much appreciated in the market, gave rise to competition. These channels came up with the ultimate theory that listeners for music were more than for news. Children, youth and adults everyone like music and that too when viewers got to listen the new film songs, it was quite obvious that they would switch to FM channels from AIR. Radio started following the needs of the youth as well as its own profit. Commercials introduced removed the monotony of a programmes and also increased the revenue. People appreciated the use of commercials as it was the best tool for creating awareness and exchange of knowledge. So here again genre was affected.

16. The language used by FM channels is very informal. Listeners like this informality more rather than the formal language of AIR. Today through radio people make announcements of some event organized in their own city or live programmes or concerts. So only news of national importance is not the content of radio news. People even love to listen news about their city, community and society in which they live. So radio is no more confined to national political news but it is also a place where people can share social issues and recent technologies or discoveries that may not be too big. FM channels involve the listeners along with them by playing different games or answering to their queries or solving their problems either by letter or through phone calls. So today it’s a two way communication process rather than one way. Again with the rise in technology, competition has increased a lot in the market. Every private FM channel used the best technology. For example BIG FM was the first one to use Dolby Digital Technology.