In industry parlance, she fits into the customer profile that seeks out radios to preserve continuity. Yet, Pant realised she was a rare case when she went shopping for a radio after moving to IIT Delhi from Bareilly for her post-graduation. “It became almost like a quest because nobody stocked it. Brands such as Sony offer CD players fitted with radios and I seemed to be the only one demanding a standalone. My friends told me to get a cellphone radio instead,” she recalls. “I finally picked up an unbranded Chinese standalone from the grey market. My room-mates nicknamed it the tuntuna because it was always playing.”
She prefers the short-wave programmes from all corners of the world—Voice of America and BBC being her favourites. “Never mind, where I am in the house, I can hear my radio. There are no hassles of ear-plugs and I never lose track of the time,” she says. Yet, it’s a sign of the times that only one store in Delhi—in the old quarters of the city—stocks standalone Philips radios.
Shweta S, a 30-something publishing professional based in Delhi, blames bad reception of SW and MW for the death of the radio. At one time, Radio Ceylon was hot with music lovers. This was where Ameen Sayani hosted Cibaca Geetmala, and this was also where one listened to the latest Western music, still alien to the Akashvani fans. On Sunday evenings, the 1970s youth who loved Beatles and Abba tuned in. “I am so tired of the frequent ad breaks and incessant banter of FM RJs that I would really like to tune into SW and MW but all I get are garbled sounds,” she says.
Sukant Gupta, an advocate at the Punjab and Haryana High Court, refuses to give in. He makes it a point never to miss the BBC news on the Murphy he bought on a visit to London. And he listens to it with a pencil and paper ready. Ever since 1990, he has been assiduously writing down the news as it was being read. Last year, with several thousand sheets of papers filled with the news broadcasts, he found a place in the Limca Book of Records.

... contd.