Women and Community Radio

To bring about a socio-economic change in a community communication plays a major role, which is also the basic right of human beings. Addressing to a particular community or society can be made effective through community mediums.

Radio is the most widespread and accepted medium globally. Community Radio is one o the low cost and effective means of the fast growing ICT medium to reach the grassroots. Its also because of radio’s own property simple operation at both transmission and the receiving end.

Women play a significant and dynamic role in building up the community. Believing that women are the backbone of the society and having the potential of transforming the community, Community Radio would be an ideal medium for them to bring out a positive change that is needed for them

Women in Community Radio – International Experiences

Actually this happened in Uganda when 101.7-MAMA FM was set up, which is Africa’s first women Community Radio Station to address the plight of the under privileged and minority. It provided an interactive accessible medium for the under privileged particularly women in rural and semi-urban communities, to enable them develop and progress along side their counterparts in urban areas by broadcasting gender sensitive educational programmes and offering training/practical experience for female journalists.

From 6^th March 2003 Afghanistan commenced its first independent community FM radio station managed and operated by women from Kabul. And Nepal also recently got itself added to this list.

Women in Community Radio – Indian Experiences

India has many success stories of women participating in the community radio movement even when community radio was at its infant stage in India. One of them is from Budhikote, a small village in Karnataka where 36 women’s self help groups decided to have their own ICT facility. They contributed 50 rupees every month to establish a cable radio network connecting all the 750 households of the village in order to narrowcast the audio programmes they are producing at the Budhikote Community Multi Media Center.

The center was established with the support from UNESCO. Earlier the programmes were played back during weekly group listening sessions in the self help groups meetings. Discovery they made recently that computers could be used to edits and produce cable community radio programmes has given them new insights to the ICTs.

In 1998, Drishti in partnership with Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan (KMVS), a women’s organization based in Bhuj, initiated their Community Radio programmes in India. In the process women’s participation in learning radio programming has made them to come up with four community radio series which has been broadcast in All India Radio by leasing weeking Airtime from 2001. The partnership between rural and urban & neo-literate and professional writer, along with a proper feedback studies, can made a difference in the lives of the rural people.

On an experimental basis, India’s first community radio that went on air is Mana Radio at Orvakallu in Kurnool district of the Andhra Pradesh province in October 2002 which is part of the communications programme of the United Nations Development Programme. Woman members of the Mandal Ikya Sangham set up the station. It broadcast 45 minutes of programming every Monday from 6 to 6.45 pm. Radio signals were being broadcast at FM 900 MHz. But later the Government of India closed the station saying that running such a station is illegal. The signal radius is likely to be increased to 5 km or more, now that India has allowed the setting up of community radio stations. The station's locally-generated programmes, including a play and a news bulletin, had received good response from the villagers. Women of the village had gained confidence in doing anything as they are running a radio station by recording and also editing programmes. Even illiterate women came forward to prepare programmes.

Women Self Help Groups through Community Radio

With all these Community Radio stations trying their alternate means to broadcast their programmes, Anna FM in Anna University was the first Community Radio Channel in India to officially go on air which is mainly supported by the staff and students of the university. Anna FM throught its Live Phone-In weekend show “Samuthaya Nearkannal” was able to adopt a women community and with active participation of the women, they were able to form a Self Help Group and trained them in manufacturing palm-leaf based handicrafts right from the comfort of their homes and market them fruitfully. Now around three Women Self Help Groups have been formed.

With success of this SHG formation and training, in 2005 Anna FM with Department of Science and Technologies support initiated a project in participatory science communication for disadvantaged women in the Anna FM coverage zone. The objective of the project is to impart scientific awareness for everyday living through Anna FM and thereby enhance their livelihoods, in which the women audience actively participatd in the programme by providing content also in production after several training workshops. The programme was titled as Sakthi Arivayadi.

The project at Anna FM proved to increase the Science awareness and lifestyle of the women in the adopted community. Based on its success at Anna FM, Now the project is being implemented in around 13 Community Radio Stations in India in which the women folk are being trained for 30-minute programmes on women’s issues that will be broadcast in their stations throughout the year, finally resulting around 5000 women voices aired on Community Radio stations in one year.

Conclusion

From the above examples and success stories, given the potential of the community radio being explored at the grassroots level in the right way with a strong and active participation of women in it can bring about a positive impact in the development of the society.

Nila Community Radio: Turning Passive Listeners into Active Content Providers

Nila Community Radio: Turning Passive Listeners into Active Content Providers.

Community Radio in India has just started its rolling, with around 35 stations on air and around 200 stations in queue to be on air. The general definition of Community Radio is radio for the community, by the community and of the community, where the community radio itself was seen as a wholesome and complete medium to address the community, but now the activities and the work that the community radio stations in India are doing add a new dimension to community radio.

It doesn’t stop with just broadcasting awareness programme or an experts interview, or just the communities being trained and becoming part of the volunteer / production team, or just doing a baseline or feedback study, the stations have moved up to another level where passive programme turned into active programme., by turning passive listeners into active listeners and content sources.

The stations now started integrating action based community programme, by visiting the communities not just for an interview or feedback study, but to actually demonstrate what is broadcast. It’s not only stopping with a doctor telling about the symptom of breast cancer, it’s now the doctors going to the community and checking the community’s health.

Nila (Moon) CR which is situated in a rural area between Puducherry and Tamilnadu border, caters to rural village people whose main occupation is agriculture. The support of the Medical College and the communities support, the Nila CR is now reaching the communities through its extension programme.

Health Camp:

An announcement goes on air for a week saying that a health camp would be conducted on so and so date, apart from the handbills that was circulated to the villagers. On the announced day a team of volunteers, field workers, Medical experts with the management team get in to the village, where the people are ready waiting under the temporary tent made by the station team and the active village volunteers. After the customary inauguration, traditional welcome speeches and respects; the Health Camp starts.

People wait in queue for their health check ups, some people who visited the previous camps had their Out Patient Record book and some filled it for the first time, after the diagnosis the doctors’ advice on medicines and further treatments. The innocent village people went back. The Medical College of the management provides free medical care for the needed people when they approach with their OP records.

But the stations work doesn’t stop with this, the station team discuss with the medical team on the various health issues, awareness that the village needs and they draw upon a schedule where more programme on the issue that needs to be discussed for that village are aired, this is a continuous process of the station.

One of the villager was shocked to know that she was suffering from breast cancer when she came in for check up in one of the camps, then the treatment was given to her and she is fine now, the station continuously broadcasted awareness programme on breast cancer and it was surprised that the next day there were many people from that village at the medical college to check themselves for breast cancer.

Nutritious Food Camp:

It’s not only health camp, there is something tasty that the station cooked up, that’s the delicious nutritious food camp, where the preliminary preparations were exactly same with the health camp. Now the village people were asked to prepare tasty nutritious food with locally available resources in their village. The cooked food was displayed at the camp counter for the judges and others to taste. After tasting the yummy and nutritious rich food the judges announced the winners and the management which didn’t wanted to disappoint the participants, so it gave all the participants a gift to take to with them.

The recipes are now cooked into programme and filled the air time for the coming days, thus making the delicious nutritious food not only filling the appetite of the judges but also the community’s.

Herbal Medicine Camp:

After the medical check ups, tasting nutritious food, the next is herbal medicine camp where the village people are assembled in Herbal Garden which is about 2 acres, maintained and run by a NGO funded by the state Government. Again after the traditional welcome speeches and welcoming, the experts start demonstrating the importance of herbal medicines, plants and most of these are very much available in their own village, but its importance is ignored or unknown. Not only giving its medicinal importance, but also the experts demonstrate how the Self Help Groups can make products out of those plants and how it can become their livelihood. Similar to other camps, even this goes on air.

Conclusion:

So apart from the main broadcasts the station follows a different strategy of “action” plan where the programme are turned in to active plans, where the listeners are turned into active listeners, not only by participating in the radio programme but also becoming the source, content for the same. Thus the local indigenous knowledge, culture and content are also documented and preserved. The community also feels that something materialistic is happening to them through Nila CR, which makes them to tune in to the station. It is an interesting cycle of action where each of the activity is interleaved with radio programme and the listener making the Community Radio really a Community Radio

Community Radio Initiatives in India

Community Radio Initiatives in India
- a tour report

Context and Background
In the wake of a decision by the Bangladeshi government to introduce community radio (CR) and free up the airwaves for people’s voices, Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia (CEMCA) organized a guided tour, for three Bangladeshi CR practitioners, to three community radio stations in India.

The CR movement in India dates back to 2000 where many NGOs, CSOs reached out to local communities by narrowcasting the programme either by cable cast or closed listener group or hiring airtime on primary FM channels. The movement in India is vibrant by itself with dynamic success stories and regular updation.

In December 2002, the Government of India decided to open up the Community Radio broadcasting sector by announcing a new policy. Under this policy, Community Radio Licenses can be granted to educational institutions, organizations that are recognized by the Central Government or the State Government. These also include the Universities and Institutes of Technology, management and residential schools. This policy motivated many public and private educational institutions to start community radio stations.

The new community radio policy was approved by the Government of India in late 2006; this now provided NGOs / CSOs / Krishhi Vigyan Kendras a platform to use this media tool to widen the scope of their work at the grassroots level in the areas of human development, poverty reduction, social justice and social action.

Till May 2008, the Government of India has received around 227 applications under the new policy,
out of which 89 have been issued Letter of Intents – the list comprises 25 KVKS, 25 NGOs / CSOs
and 39 educational institutions. According to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 35 stations
are operational.

OneWorld South Asia was invited to associate with this initiative; two members were deputed to accompany the team, and providing knowledge inputs that would go into making the visit more meaningful to our South Asian partners.

Objective
The idea was to demonstrate to our Bangladeshi counterparts, the range of possibilities and practical details, while facilitating first hand interaction and knowledge sharing on the technical, managerial and promotional aspects of CR stations in India. A significant aspect of community interaction was also organized, in order to highlight an understanding of the audience and to factor community outreach and participation in CR initiatives. All three stations have been operational for over three years, with each having its own style, strategy, and success stories. Some of the observations made at the stations and the community are mentioned below station wise.

Date of Visit: 3^rd to 4^th June 2008.

Station Name: Vasundara Vahini 90.4, Baramathi, Pune District
Main Language: Marathi, Hindi
Audience: Farmers, Farmer Families
Transmitter Power: 50 Watts
Reach: around 25 Kms

Station Infrastructure:
The station is based in Vidya Pratishthan's Institute of Information Technology (VIIT). The station itself is located at the Campus entrance, on the second floor of a community centre that houses a cafeteria, book shop and other utility shops; a place commonly frequented by students and other people from the campus vicinity as well.

The station has two studios - one for transmission and other for recording / dubbing and a transmitter room. The cost of the whole studio set up was 25 lakhs. The station is on air for more than 3 years.

Audience and Broadcast:
The main audience that Vasundara Vahini caters to are the farmers from the near by villages and their families. Many of ther programmes are on farming techniques, new methods of farming, marketing the farm products. The station broadcasts mainly in Marathi from 6am to 10am in the morning session; the same programmes are repeated in the evening from 4pm to 8pm, reaching various villages spread over 25 KM, over a 5 watt BEL transmitter.

Programme Compostion:
Most of the programmes are for farmers, which gives information on the techniques, methods, and products for better agricultural productivity; these programmes are more in the interview format. Other programmes target women’s group and are focused around science and health issues. Yet another programme is book reading and literature. Devotional songs also occupy a share of the air time. Every transmission starts with a devotional song which is said to be a mantra recited to the air waves.

Organization Structure:
The station is managed by a Station In Charge and Project In Charge, with coordination from their Director. There is also an advisory board and an external coordination committee comprising of the Tehsildar, BDO, representative from the Police Department, Panchayat etc., that meets fortnightly and gives guidance and ideas for the station. The operations of the station are run by seven multi skilled producers selected from the community who are appointed by the station. These producers double up as field officers, marketing executives, announcers, script writers, editors etc., and ensure that the audience get their fare on a daily basis.

Community Visit:
Community visit to Matachirvadi, basically an agriculture village which is about 25KMs from the station, the signal is clear and the radio is received well and listened by the community. The village has farmer club which is really active in that area. Farmers listen to programme of Vasundra Vahini for their knowledge, information and entertainment. Their family members also listen to the programme. The Gram Panchayat received Nirmal Gram Scheme award from the Prime Minister of India. The village follows a smoke free and alcohol free code, where none of the villagers either smoke to drink in the village.

Success Story:
One of the farmers claimed that his yield went upto 70 Kgs, after adapting to a particular way of farming that was broadcast on Vasundara Vahini, whereas his usual yield would be around 40 to 50 Kgs.

Another success story is that of a farmer who adopted the advice given on Vasundara Vahini, and demonstrated the result to other farmers, in due course the entire village people adopted the idea.

A success story of the Science for Women programme was recorded when a village woman by name Vandana Kate, trained by the Vasundara Vahini volunteers in recording and production, was invited to be a community producer for the station; her own village people nominated her for the gram panchayat elections. Now, many women are keen to taking associate themselves with Vasundara Vahini.

Sustainability:
Even though the initial capital cost for the stations infrastructure is funded by the college, operations and running costs of the station is a major concern. Science for Women programme funded by (Department of Science and Technology (DST) meets up the running cost to an extent and now recently they have started airing advertisements, if this is going to be continued, then the station can become self sustainable.

Suggestions:
Integration of the farmers club, Gram Panchayat and other local bodies with the station would turn the passive listeners in to active listeners, adding more value to Community Radio.

Village community people should be actively involved in the external coordination committee.

One suggestion that was discussed with the station In Charge and Volunteers is to conduct a medical camp and workshop for the community, at the end of the workshop and the medical camp, programme for the Science for women can be produced actively involving the community.

One more suggestion discussed with them was to have the current station volunteers as coordinators who would coordinate with specific villages and air programmes around issues emanating from that village.

Date of Visit: 6^th and 7^th June 2008.
Station Name: Nila CR 90.4 MHz, Puducherry.
Main Language: Tamil
Audience: Farmers, Students, Village people
Transmitter Power: 50 Watts
Reach: around 10-15

Station Infrastructure:
The station is based in Sri Manakula Vinayagar Engineering College. The management also runs a medical college in a near by college which closely works with station.

The station has two studios one for transmission and other for recording / dubbing and a transmitter room. The studio set up is very similar to Vasundra Vahini, except for the transmitter which is an Italian transmitter. The cost of the whole studio set up was 25 Lakhs. The station has been on air for more than 3 years. This was the first educational institution to apply for Community Radio in India

Audience and Broadcast:

The main audience that Nila CR caters are the farmers, women, students in the near by villages and students of their college. The programmes address issues of agriculture, health awareness, education, environmental, and social awareness. Programmes in Tamil are broadcast from 4pm to 6pm and then repeated the next morning from 4pm to 8pm, reaching various villages spread over 15 KM, with their 50 watt RVR transmitter.

Programme Composition
There are programmes for farmers on various agriculture techniques,on health mainly for women, on education for students and on other social issues of general interest and value to the community. One of their main programmes, is a DST “Nila Penne” that targets women’s group are Science and health issues is DST funded Science for Women programme. The other main programme are social awareness, consumer awareness, narcotic awareness etc., devotional music also occupy a share of the air time.

Organization Structure:

The station contains seven multi skilled producers selected from the community who are appointed by the station. Apart from the producers the station also has field officers, PROs. Constant support from the management, students and faculties help the station to be successful.

Community Visit:

Visit to Kamulam which is an agriculture village, 8KMs from the station. A health camp was organized by the station, in which medical doctors from their college did a free health check up for the village people and were prescribed medicines and further treatment as needed. Around 250 village people had benefited from that camp. Regular camps of this sort are organized by Nila CR. Announcements regarding the camp are broadcast through the radio apart from distributing hand bills. After the camp, programme would be aired based on the symptoms and diseases reported from that village. This is one classic example where Community Radio is integrated with other service to serve the community effectively.

The health camp was followed by a competition on nutrition, where teams from the village prepared nutritious food from the resources available in their village; the best dish was identified, and applauded whereas all participants were given a small prize. These recipes would be broadcast on air in the following days for other community members to be benefited. The names of the winners and competitors would also be announced, giving them the pride of place in the village. This is an example of how useful local content from the community can be collected, apart from building awareness on the importance of nutritious food.

A herbal medicine camp for a different village was organized by the station in a herbal garden where the importance of herbal and alternate; how SHGs can produce products from the available herbals; demonstrations and explanations of various herbals, medicines by the experts were also given. Following the camp, regular programme on this would also be aired. This camp showed how to create interest among listeners by doing live interactions with the audience apart from regular broadcasts.

Success Story:

One of the village women came to know that she was suffering from breast cancer through one of the medical camp organized by the station and treatment was given to her by the Medical College. As a result, the whole village came for their check-ups and now they are fully aware of breast cancer, its symptoms and causes.

Another woman said that her husband was prone to alcohol and she took him to the hospital for counselling after listening to a programme on effects and cure of drinking habit. Now he is fine.

Sustainability:
The initial capital cost for the station’s infrastructure is funded by the college. The support of their medical college and the management makes its running successful. The station is not in a mood to air advertisements, as this may add to their workload, the funds from the management and the funds from DST for Science for Women meets up the running cost to an extent. They feel that instead of advertisements, funds from projects like this may be helpful in bringing out good programme for the community.

Suggestions / Comments:
Even though integration of students, staff and community is clearly seen, if more community members become the producers, anchors for Nila CR, it would be excellent.

The integration of medical college with CR and support from the faculty members makes the station a classic example how community radio stations in campus can serve the community.

Date of Visit: 9^th June 2008.

Station Name: Namma Dhwani, Budhikote
Main Language: Kannada
Audience: SHGs, Farmers, Village people
Transmitter Power: Applied for SACFA, Narrowcasting
Reach: around 10Kms

Station Infrastructure:
The station is based in Jagruthi Resource Center supported by MYRADA. Initially Namma Dhwani was started as project with collaboration between MYRADA and Voices. MYRADA used the concept community radio by producing and narrowcasting need based programme for the community through Jagruthi Resource Center. The studio is a low cost acoustic studio costing about Rs.75,000 for acoustics. Standard equipment has been used and there has not been a compromise on cost. UNESCO has funded the studio and equipment.

This CR is different from others in a sense that it’s outreached is based entirely on narrowcasting and it is located in a Community Resource Center.

Audience and Broadcast:
The main audiences that Namma Dhwani caters to are women’s self help groups, farmers, students and children. Narrowcasting is done through cable TV sets and loudspeaker. For technical reasons cable casting has been stopped last year and narrowcasting through loudspeaker has also been stopped few months back. Now narrowcasting in SHG meetings are done once in a month.

Programme Composition
The CR is used as a communication medium to reach the community apart from their capacity building, trainings etc., Programme on legal awareness and social issues are most popular among the community. Live coverage of Gram Panchayat meetings and elections also make the narrowcast RELEVANT AND EXCITING for the community.

Organization Structure:
The Resource Center is managed by a management committee and run by the Resource Centre Manager along with an Assistant and Community Resource Persons. A Namma Dhwani production team produces programme for Namma Dhwani.

Community Visit:
Visit to a SHG was an enriching experience where the SHG members were happy to share their experience of being together and how Jagruthi Resource Center has built their capacities through various programmes.

Success Story:
One of the management committee members narrated how narrowcasting the meeting of a Gram Panchayat where the members were seen fighting and abusing each other exposed the state and scenario of the local elected representatives.

Sustainability:
The capital cost for the Audio Production Center was funded by UNESCO through Voices and MYRADA. They sell the audio cassettes of the programmes at a cost of Rs.40 to other CSO and NGOs, but this is not a regular source of income. A subscription fee of Rs.1000 per year is collected from each Self Help Group and in return the CRC provides services like auditing, monitoring and following up with their events.

Suggestions / Comments:

The usage of VSAT terminal by the community members for live interaction with various persons is quite impressive.
New models for sustainability for a Community Resource Center are seen in action.

Once the station is on air with regular broadcast, the community would use the potential of community radio to the maximum.

General Observations / Suggestions:

1. The studio resources of all the stations are not utilized fully. If the unused studio infrastructure (studio timing) can be rented / leased for other production centers this may form a part of revenue to the stations.

2. More integration between the local stakeholders should be brought in all three stations.

3. The content is going to be the king in future, all three stations have to see to that the content is preserved and archived in such a manner it is utilized to the fullest extent.

4. The volunteers are trained only for a basic level production so that the potential is not realized, both in terms of content quality and range of programme formats and variety.

5. We found that each station does an enormous amount of work, but lack of documentation renders this invisible and people are not able to convert the learnings for future application; the achievements of the stations are also lost in the process. Therefore documentation of the work and experiences is another aspect upon which the stations need to concentrate.

Team:

Ashraf Abeer, Deputy Director, DNet, Bangladesh

Saifuddi Sabuj, Director, Audio Visual Production, Rupantar, Bangladesh

Sohel Awrangzeb, Director Technical, BNNRC, Bangladesh

Nirnay J Chettri, OneWorld South Asia

Satish N, OneWorld South Asia