The minister for information and broadcasting, Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi made it clear to this newspaper in an interaction this week that FM radio would be allowed to air cricket commentary. After all, sports was “entertainment”, not news. As radio listeners do not have the privilege of choosing between channels for news and have to confine themselves to the government channel, the minister’s statement reinforced the government’s patronising tone when it speaks of radio . After all, the citizen of India is allowed to vote and change the government, but is not, in the assessment of successive governments, mature enough to choose which channel he wishes to turn to for the news! Dasmunshi’s statement was more proof that the Centre’s policy on radio has been completely skewed and inconsistent with the rest of its media policy — ever since Independence, irrespective of which political group is in power.

The ministry of information and broadcasting has had it so good all these years — that is, it has not been questioned over its absurd media policy. The ministry gets flak for constantly wanting to ban and regulate things on television or for the Broadcasting Bill 2006, but not over its radio policy.

Recently a forum of 70 community groups got together in the capital, trying to emphasise the power of radio in their local, small contexts. They spoke persuasively of their local ‘stations’ (just places which record local information/ do some troubleshooting for problems on cassettes, which is played down to groups, on loudspeakers), and their place in the small communities they represent — be it Kutch in Gujarat, Chala Ho Gaon Mein in Palamau, Medak in Andhra Pradesh or the more adventurous real-time broadcaster, Raghav Mahto’s ‘Mansoorpur FM’ in Vaishali — who was prosecuted for playing music last year. These groups are up against a formidable mindset, despite permission to broadcast ‘in principle’.

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