History of All India Radio

The radio broadcasting service was later designated ‘All India Radio’ (AIR) and was placed under a separate Ministry-the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The AIR is controlled by a Director General, who is assisted by several Deputy Directors and a Chief Engineer.

Broadcasting, in its significance, reach and impact, constitutes the most powerful medium of mass communication in India. Its importance, as a medium of information and education is particularly great in a vast and developing country like India where the reach of the printed word is not very wide or deep. While the total circulation of all the newspapers in India, including both English and Indian language papers, is around 8 million, there are, according to a recent estimate, nearly 400 million (out of a total population of 625 million) potential listeners to All India Radio.

Broadcasting in India is a national service, developed and operated by the Government of India. All India Radio (also known as Akashvani) operates this service; over a network of broadcasting stations located ail over the country.

Starting with 6 broadcasting stations in 1947, the AIR today has a network of 82 broadcasting stations.

• External Services

AIR made its first broadcast to listeners outside India on October 1, 1939. Today the External Services of AIR broadcast in 25 languages for about 50 hours daily round-the-clock, reaching listeners in widely scattered areas of the world.

• VividhBharati

A self-contained service of popular entertainment, known as VividhBharati was started in October 1957 to meet the growing demand for popular music and light features.

Commercial advertising was introduced on AIR in November, 1967, from the Bombay-Nagpur channel of Vividh-Bharati on an experimental basis. It was gradually extended to Calcutta (1968); Delhi and Madras-Tiruchirapalli (1969); Chandigarh-Jullundur- Bangalore, Dharwar, Ahmedabad- Rajkot, Kanpur-Lucknow-Allahabad (1970), Hyderabad-Vijayawada (1971) and Bhopal, Indore, Cuttack, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Patna, Ranchi and Trivandrum (1975). Advertisements are accepted in any language as tape-recorded ‘spots’ of 15 seconds or 30 seconds duration.

VividhBharati, an alternative national service of All India Radio, now forms a part of the Central Sales Unit of the Commercial Broadcasting Service. It has also started originating programmes.

• National service

Started in July 1952, the weekly National Programme of Music provides an opportunity to listeners to hear well-known exponents of Hindustani and Karnataka music. At suitable intervals, programmes based on recordings of old masters are also featured in this programme.

The National Programme of Features attempts to mirror the progress made in different spheres of development in the country and to project various aspects of its social and cultural life. The original broadcast of this feature might be in Hindi or English, but these are invariably translated into all regional languages and presented from the regional stations.

Programmes for the youth in YuvaVani are broadcast from Kolkatta, Delhi, Hyderabad, Jammu, Patna and Srinagar stations.This service provides a forum to the youth between the ages of l5 and 25 years, who present their viewpoint by participating in a wide range of programmes-talks, discussions interviews, plays, features and music. A youth news bulletin is also broadcast by the youth themselves.