Type | Government Organisation |
---|---|
Country | |
Headquarters | Akashvani Bhavan Sansad Marg, New Delhi – 110001, Delhi, India |
Motto | Bahujanahitaya Bahujanasukhaya (बहुजनहिताय बहुजनसुखाय) [1] |
Ownership | |
Owner | Prasar Bharati |
Parent | Government of India |
History | |
Launch date | 8 June 1936 (as All India Radio) AIR 5 May 2023 (as Akashvani) |
Coverage | |
Availability | National International |
Links | |
Website | All India Radio, News on AIR |
All India Radio (AIR) aka Akashvani (literal meaning "Voice from the Sky"), is an Indian state-owned public radio broadcaster founded by the Government of India, owned by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and one of Prasar Bharati's two divisions. It was established in 1936. [2] It is the sister service of Prasar Bharati's Doordarshan, an Indian television broadcaster. [3] Headquartered in the Akashvani Bhavan building in New Delhi, it houses the Drama Section, the FM Section, and the National Service, and is also home to the Indian television station Doordarshan Kendra, (Delhi).
In terms of the number of languages transmitted, the range of socioeconomic variety it serves, and the size of its broadcasting organisation, Akashvani is the largest radio network in the world. AIR's home service comprises 420 stations located across the country, reaching nearly 92% of the country's area and 99.19% of the total population, and has programming in 23 languages and 179 dialects. [4]
Akashvani is a Sanskrit word meaning 'celestial announcement' or 'voice from the sky/heaven'. In Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism, Akashvanis are often featured in stories as a medium of communication from heaven to mankind.
When the Indian State Broadcasting Service (ISBS) was renamed All India Radio, Rabindranath Tagore rechristened it as Akashvani, the voice that comes over from the skies, through a poem penned for the inauguration of Kolkata's shortwave service. [5] [6]
'Akashavani' was also used in the context of radio by M. V. Gopalaswami in 1936 after setting up India's first private radio station in his residence, "Vittal Vihar" (about two hundred yards from AIR's current Mysore radio station). [7] Akashvani was later given as All India Radio's on-air name in 1957; given its literal meaning in Sanskrit, it was believed to be a more than suitable name for a broadcaster. The name "Akashwani" was suggested by the poet Pandit Narendra Sharma.
Broadcasting began in June 1923 during the British Raj with programmes by the Bombay Presidency Radio Club and other radio clubs. According to an agreement on 23 July 1927, the private Indian Broadcasting Company Ltd (IBC) was authorized to operate two radio stations: the Mumbai station which began on 23 July 1927, and the Kolkata station which followed on 26 August 1927. The company went into liquidation on 1 March 1930. The government took over the broadcasting facilities and began the Indian State Broadcasting Service (ISBS) on 1 April 1930 on an experimental basis for two years, and permanently in May 1932 it then went on to become All India Radio on 8 June 1936. [2]
On 1 October 1939, the External Service began with a broadcast in Pashto. It was intended to counter radio propaganda from Germany directed at Afghanistan, Iran, and Arab nations. The year 1939 also saw the opening of the Dhaka station of Eastern India, in what is now Bangladesh. This station catered to and nurtured the pioneers of Bengali intellectuals. The foremost among them, Natyaguru Nurul Momen, became the trailblazer of the talk show in 1939. He wrote and directed the first modern radio play for this station in 1942.
When India became independent in 1947, the AIR network had only six stations (Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Lucknow, and Tiruchirappalli). The three radio stations in Lahore, Peshawar and Dhaka remained in what became Pakistan after the division. The total number of radio sets in India at that time was about 275,000.
In August 1947, All India Radio hired its first female newsreader, Saeeda Bano, who read the news in Urdu. [8]
On 3 October 1957, the Vividh Bharati Service was launched, to compete with Radio Ceylon. Television broadcasting began in Delhi in 1959 as part of AIR, but was split off from the radio network as Doordarshan on 1 April 1976. [9] FM broadcasting began on 23 July 1977 in Chennai, and expanded during the 1990s. [10]
Deccan Radio (Nizam Radio 1932), the first radio station in Hyderabad State (now Hyderabad), went live on air on 3 February 1935. It was launched by Mir Osman Ali Khan the seventh Nizam of Hyderabad with a transmitting power of 200 Watts. On 1 April 1950, Deccan Radio was taken over by the Indian Government, and in 1956 it was merged with All India Radio (AIR). Since then, it has been known as AIR-Hyderabad (100 kW). [11]
AIR has many services in a number of languages, each serving different regions across India.
Vividh Bharati began in 1957 and is one of the best-known services of All India Radio. Its name roughly translates as "Diverse Indian". It is also known as the Commercial Broadcasting Service or CBS. Commercially, it is the most accessible AIR network and is popular in Mumbai and other large cities. Vividh Bharati offers a wide range of programmes including news, film music, short plays, music and comedy. It operates on different mediumwave as well as FM frequencies in each city.
Some programmes broadcast on Vividh Bharati are:
The Central Sales Unit (CSU), located in Mumbai, handles commercial aspects of AIR. [12]
The headquarters of the Regional Deputy Directors General are located in Delhi and Chandigarh (NR), Lucknow and Bhopal (CR), Guwahati (NER), Kolkata (ER), Mumbai and Ahmedabad (WR), Chennai and Bangalore (SR). [15] All frequencies are in kHz, unless otherwise noted. Most of the channels are also available online.
City | Frequency | City | Frequency | City | Frequency |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Agra | 1530 | Ajmer | 603 | Allahabad | 1026 |
Almora | 999 | Barmer | 1458 | Bikaner | 1395 |
Chairhara (Budgam) | 1485 | Delhi A | 819 | Delhi B | 666 |
Delhi C ( Vividh Bharti ) | 1368 | Delhi D (Yuv-vani) | 1017 | Delhi (National Channel) | 1215 |
Diskit | 1602 | Faizabad | 1485 | Gorakhpur | 909 |
Jaipur A | 1476 | Jalandhar A | 873 | Jalandhar B | 702 |
Jammu A | 990 | Jodhpur A | 531 | Kalpa (Kinnaur) | 1584 |
Kargil A | 684 | Kargil B | 1584 | Khalsi | 1485 |
Kota | 1413 | Kupwara | 1350 | Leh | 1053 |
Lucknow A | 747 | Lucknow C | 1278 | Mathura | 1584 |
Najibabad | 954 | Naushera | 1089 | Nyoma | 1485 |
Padam | 1584 | Pauri | 1602 | Pithoragarh | 1602 |
Rampur | 891 | Rohtak | 1143 | Shimla | 774 |
Budgam | 1116 | Budgam A | 1224 | Srinagar C | 918 |
Tiesuru | 1602 | Udaipur | 1125 | Uttarkashi | 1602 |
Varanasi A | 1242 | Sawai Madhopur | FM 101.5 MHz | Raebareli | FM 102.8 MHz |
City | Frequency | City | Frequency |
---|---|---|---|
Agartala | 1269 | Guwahati A | 729 |
Shillong | 864 | Imphal | 882 |
City | Frequency | City | Frequency |
---|---|---|---|
Bhagalpur | 1458, 1206 | Chinsurah ((Akashvani Maitree), 1 MegaWatt Transmitter Capacity) | 594 & 1134 |
Cuttack A | 972 | Darbhanga | 1296 |
Jamshedpur | 1584 | Gitanjali (Kolkata A)(200 KW Transmitter Capacity) | 657 |
Sanchayita (Kolkata B)(100 KW Transmitter Capacity) | 1008 | Kolkata C (Vividh Bharati) | 1323 kHz Medium Wave as well as 101.8 MHZ FM |
Patna A | 621 | Ranchi A | 549 |
Muzaffarpur A | FM 100.1 MHz | Muzaffarpur B | FM 106.4 MHz |
Kolkata (FM Rainbow) (20 KW Transmitter Capacity) | FM 107.0 MHz | Kolkata (FM Gold)(20 KW Transmitter Capacity) | FM 100.2 MHz |
Kurseong | 1440 kHz as well as FM 102.3 MHZ (5 KW Transmitter Capacity) | Siliguri | 711 kHz (200 KW DRM Transmitter Capacity) |
Santiniketan (Bolpur) | FM 103.1 MHz (3 KW Transmitter Capacity) | Murshidabad (6 KW Transmitter Capacity) | FM 102.2 MHz |
City | Frequency | City | Frequency |
---|---|---|---|
Ahmedabad A | 846 | Aurangabad | 1521 |
Bhopal A | 1593 | Chhindwara | FM 102.2 MHz |
Chhatarpur | 675 | Gwalior | 1386 |
Indore A | 648 | Jabalpur A | 801 |
Mumbai A | 1044 | Mumbai B (Asmita Marathi) | 558 |
Mumbai C ( Vividh Bharati ) | 1188 | Nagpur A | 585 |
Nagpur B (National Channel, 1 MW) | 1566 | Panaji A | 1287 |
Panaji B (Vividh Bharati) | 828 | Pune A | 792 |
Rajkot A | 810 | Ratnagiri | 1143 |
Solapur | 1602 | Sangli | 1251 |
Parbhani A | FM 102.0 MHz | Jabalpur Vividh Bharati | 102.9 |
Mysore | FM 100.6 MHz | Jalgaon | 963 |
City | Frequency | City | Frequency |
---|---|---|---|
Bengaluru | 612 kHz | Bengaluru (Vividha Bharati) | 102.9 MHz |
Bangalore (Rainbow FM) | 101.3 MHz | Bhadravati | 675 kHz |
Dharwad | 765 kHz | Dharwad FM | 103.0 MHz |
Hassan | 1107 kHZ | Kalburagi | 1107 kHz |
Mangaluru | 1089 kHz | Mangalore FM | 100.3 MHz |
Madikeri FM | 103.1 MHz | Sringeri FM | 101 MHz |
Hyderabad | 738 kHz | Hyderabad (FM Rainbow) | 101.9 MHz |
Hyderabad (Vivida Bharati) | 102.8 MHz | Warangal | 103.5 MHz |
Vijayawada | 103.4 MHz |
The external services of All India Radio are broadcast in 27 languages to countries outside India via high-power shortwave radio broadcasts. Mediumwave is also used to reach neighbouring countries. In addition to broadcasts targeted at specific countries by language, there is a General Overseas Service broadcasting in English with 8+1⁄4 hours of programming each day aimed at a general international audience. The external broadcasts began on 1 October 1939 by the British government to counter the propaganda of the Nazis directed at the Afghan people. The first broadcasts were in Pashto, beamed to Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier Province. Broadcasts soon began in other languages including Dari, Persian, Arabic, English, Burmese, Japanese, Chinese, Malay and French. The external services broadcast in 16 foreign and 11 Indian languages, with a total programme output of 70¼ hours per day on medium and shortwave frequencies.
Location | Number of transmitters | kW | Frequency | DRM ! |
---|---|---|---|---|
Aligarh (HPT) | 4 | 250 | ||
Bengaluru (SPT) | 6 | 500 | 100 kW | |
Chennai (Madras) | 1 | 100 | 720 kHz | MW |
Gorakhpur | 1 | 50 | ||
Guwahati | 1 | 50 | ||
Jalandhar (Goraya) | 1 | 300 | 702 kHz | MW |
Khampur-Delhi (HPT) | 7 | 250 | ||
Khampur-Delhi (SPT) | 2 | 500 | ||
Kingsway-Delhi | 3 | 50 | ||
Kingsway-Delhi | 2 | 100 | ||
Kolkata-Chinsurah/Mogra (SPT) | 1 | 1000 | 1134 kHz and 594 kHz (Kolkata – A) | 1142 kHz MW |
Mumbai (Malad) | 1 | 100 | ||
Nagpur (SPT) | 1 | 1000 | 1566 kHz | MW |
Panaji (HPT) | 2 | 250 | ||
Rajkot (SPT) | 1 | 1000 | 1071 kHz AIR URDU | 1080 kHz (2 MW) Vividha Bharti |
Tuticorin | 1 | 200 | 1053 kHz | MW |
Two high powered FM stations of All India Radio are being installed in Amritsar and Fazilka in the Punjab to supplement the programmes broadcast from transmitters operating from Jalandhar, New Delhi, Chandigarh and Mumbai, and to improve the broadcast services during unfavourable weather conditions in the border regions of Punjab.
Today, the External Services Division of All India Radio broadcasts daily with 57 transmissions with almost 72 hours or programming covering over 108 countries in 27 languages, of which 15 are foreign and 12 are Indian. The foreign languages are Arabic, Baluchi, Burmese, Chinese, Dari, French, Indonesian, Persian, Pushtu, Russian, Sinhala, Swahili, Thai, Tibetan, and English (General Overseas Service). The Indian languages are Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, Konkani, Kashmiri, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Nepali, Punjabi, Saraiki, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu.
The longest daily broadcast is the Urdu Service to Pakistan, around the clock on DTH (direct-broadcast satellite) and on short- and medium wave for 121⁄4 hrs. The English-language General Overseas Service is broadcast 81⁄4 hours daily. During Hajj, there are special broadcasts beamed to Saudi Arabia in Urdu. AIR is planning to produce programmes in the Balochi language. [17]
The external services of AIR are also broadcast to Europe in DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) on 9950 kHz between 17:45 and 22:30 UTC. These external transmissions are broadcast by high-power transmitters located in Aligarh, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Gorakhpur, Guwahati, Mumbai, and Panaji on shortwave and from Jalandhar, Kolkata, Nagpur, Rajkot, and Tuticorin on mediumwave. All India Radio Amritsar plans to start a booster service on the FM band. Some of these transmitters are 1000 kW (1 MW) or 500 kW. Programmes are beamed to different parts of the world, except for the Americas, and the reception quality is very good in the target areas. In each language service, the programme consists of news, commentary, a press review, talks on matters of general or cultural interest, feature programmes, documentaries, and music from India and the target region. Most programmes originate at New Broadcasting House on Parliament Street in New Delhi, with a few originating at SPT Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Jalandhar, Kolkata, HPT Malad Mumbai, Thiruvananthapuram, and Tuticorin.
The External Services Division of AIR is a link between India and rest of the world, especially in countries with Indian emigrants and Indian diaspora. It broadcasts the Indian point of view on matters of national and international importance, and demonstrates the Indian way of life through its programs. QSL cards (which are sought-after by international radio hobbyists) are issued to radio hobbyists by AIR in New Delhi for reception reports of their broadcasts.
Direct-to-home (DTH) service is a satellite broadcast service in which a large number of radio channels are digitally beamed down over a territory from a high-power satellite. AIR broadcasts various national and regional stations available to listen on DD Free Dish. The DTH signals can be received directly at homes using a small-sized dish receiver unit containing a dish antenna installed on a building's rooftop or on a wall facing clear south and one indoors. [18] DTH service is offered on twenty one channels via Insat.
Details of the Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) transmissions and frequencies are as follows:
the All India Radio launched news-on-phone service on 25 February 1998 in New Delhi; it now has service in Chennai, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Indore, Patna, and Bangalore. The service is accessible through subscriber trunk dialling (STD), international direct dialing (ISD), and local calls. There are plans to establish the service in 11 additional cities including: Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Guwahati, Gwalior, Jabalpur, Jaipur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Ranchi, and Shimla. English and Hindi hourly news bulletins may be heard live. [19] News in MP3 format may be directly played from the site, and filenames are time-stamped. AIR news bulletins are available in nine regional languages: Tamil, Kannada, Gujarati, Bengali, Marathi, North East, Punjabi, Telugu, and Urdu.
There is a long tradition of broadcasting documentary features on AIR. There is great interest in radio documentaries, particularly in countries like India, Iran, South Korea, and Malaysia. The most prominent broadcaster of English Features was Melville de Mellow, and of Hindi Features, Shiv Sagar Mishra. This format has been revived by AIR producers across India because of its flexibility, its relative low cost to produce, its messaging potential, and its creative potential.
AIR's Central Drama Unit (CDU) is responsible for the national broadcast of plays. Plays produced by the CDU are translated and produced by regional stations. Since its inception in the 1960s, the unit has produced more than 1,500 plays, and the CDU houses a repository of old scripts and productions. The National Programme of Plays is broadcast by the CDU on the fourth Thursday of each month at 9:30 pm. Each play included in the National Programme of Plays is produced in 22 Indian languages and broadcast at the same time by all regional and national network stations. The CDU also produces Chain Plays, half-hour dramas broadcast in succession by a chain of stations.
The News Service Division's Social Media Cell was established on 20 May 2013 and is responsible for providing AIR news on new media platforms such as websites, Twitter, Facebook, and SMS.
Radio Mirchi, also known as 98.3 Mirchi, is a nationwide network of private FM radio stations in India. It is owned by the EntertainmentNetwork India Ltd (ENIL), which is one of the subsidiaries of The Times Group. The tagline of Radio Mirchi is "Mirchi Sunnewaale Always Khush!". It is the first privately owned radio station in India.
The television industry in India is very diverse and produces thousands of programs in many Indian languages. More than half of all Indian households own a television. As of 2016, the country had over 900 channels of which 184 were pay channels. National channels operate in Hindi and English, in addition to channels in several other languages including Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Odia, Punjabi, Assamese, Gujarati, Urdu, Bhojpuri, Kashmiri, Konkani and Haryanvi, among others. The Hindi, Telugu and Tamil language television industries are by far the largest television industries in India.
Arts and architecture in India have had their course shaped by a synthesis of indigenous and foreign influences that have consequently shaped the course of the arts of the rest of Asia, since ancient times. Arts refer to paintings, architecture, literature, music, dance, languages and cinema. In early India, most of the arts were derived Vedic influences. After the birth of contemporary Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, and Sikhism arts flourished under the patronage of kings and emperors. The coming of Islam spawned a whole new era of Indian architecture and art. Finally the British brought their own Gothic and Roman influences and fused it with the Indian style. They have a culture infusion in their art.
AIR FM Gold is an FM radio channel in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai, India. It is run by the All India Radio, a government owned enterprise, a division of Prasar Bharati. In Mumbai, it features Hindi songs, and English songs along with hourly news in English and Hindi. It operates on 100.1 in Mumbai and on 100.1 Megahertz in Delhi. It was started on 15 August 2001 by the then Minister of Information & Broadcasting.
AIR FM Rainbow is a group of FM radio channels across India. The group of stations was previously called FM Metro, but the name was changed to FM Rainbow in 2002. The group is run by All India Radio, or AIR, a government owned enterprise. It features Hindi and regional language songs, while also playing English music and providing hourly news in English, regional language and/or Hindi. In Bhopal, FM Rainbow broadcasts in Hindi to more than 12 districts of Madhya Pradesh and 21 Bhopal City suburbs. AIR FM Rainbow Delhi airs in as many as ten cities, more than any of the other FM Rainbow frequencies. Mumbai, Lucknow, Vizag, Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Kakinada, Kochi and Bangalore all receive FM Rainbow transmissions on a variety of frequencies.
DD Free Dish is an Indian free-to-air satellite television provider owned and operated by Public Service Broadcaster Prasar Bharati. It was launched in December, 2004. In March 2022, It has a reach of over 43 million households which is more than 25% of the total TV households in the country. DD Free Dish earns by selling slots to private broadcasters through Online auction.
Ameen Sayani was an Indian radio announcer. He achieved fame and popularity across the Indian subcontinent when he presented his Binaca Geetmala program of hits over the airwaves of Radio Ceylon. He was one of the most imitated announcers. His style of addressing the audience with "Behno aur Bhaiyo " as against the traditional "Bhaiyo aur Behno" is still treated as an announcement with a melodious touch. He had produced, compered over 54,000 radio programmes and 19,000 spots/jingles since 1951.
The FM broadcasting in India began in 1977, but boomed after 2001 when the privatisation of FM broadcasting began. AIR's FM LRS was inaugurated on 1 July 2000 at 06:00 hours in Kodaikanal relaying Madurai programs in the frequency 100.5 MHz. 100.5 was so popular that LRS was upgraded to an FM Channel in just two months. The channel covered a radius of about 200km due to its location at 2200 meters above MSL at Kodaikanal. KODAI FM is popularly known as it is the biggest individual FM channel in India, in both area coverage and listenership.
Media in Goa refers to the newspapers, magazines, radio stations, cable and television networks and online media in India's smallest state. Over the past two-and-half decades, the Goa-linked online media has also grown.
The Vividh Bharati Service of All India Radio was conceptualized to combat Radio Ceylon in 1967. Due to the Indian Government stopping its short wave relay centers, VBS is only available on the Internet. Vividh Bharati radio channel was launched on 3 October 1957.
Hyderabad, in India, has a well-developed communication and media infrastructure, and the city is covered by a large network of optical fiber cables. The city's telephone system is serviced by four landline companies: BSNL, Tata Indicom, Reliance and Airtel. There are a number of mobile-phone companies: Aircel, BSNL, Airtel, Hutch Idea Cellular, Uninor, MTS, Virgin Mobile, Tata Indicom, Tata DoCoMo and Reliance. Several companies offer broadband internet access.
Zulfiqar Ali Bukhari often abbreviated as Z. A. Bukhari was a broadcaster of British India and later Pakistan. He was also a writer, poet and musician. He was the first director-general of Radio Pakistan.
Telugu-language radio was first broadcast from AIR Chennai, Egmore on 16 June 1938 at 8:15 pm when the Madras state Prime Minister Kurma Venkata Reddy Naidu and Chief Minister C. Rajagopalachari delivered inaugural speeches. In 1933 a 200 W radio station started by postal employee Mahbub Ali had gone on-air from Hyderabad, but in 1935 the Nizam of Hyderabad took control of it, and most programs were broadcast in Urdu. In July 1939 it was renamed as Deccan Radio, and on 1 April 1950 the Government of India took control from the Nizam and operated it as Akashavani. AIR Vijayawada started on 1 December 1948.
All India Radio Srinagar is a public radio station operating in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, India. All India Radio Srinagar broadcasts in Kashmiri, Urdu and Hindi languages. Formerly known as Radio Kashmir Srinagar, it was renamed as AIR Srinagar following the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019. It is one of public stations in the union territory alongside AIR Jammu and AIR Leh. All India Radio Jammu broadcasts in Dogri, Urdu and Hindi languages.
Munish Jolly is an Indian former cricketer. He played first-class match for Bengal in 1997/98. He is in the top panel of Commentators of All India Radio and is a leading Broadcaster, Voice-over artist. He had the honour of covering Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympics with Star Sports and Sony Sports Network, respectively. He has delivered commentary in Cricket World Cups, Hockey World Cups, the Prestigious National Sports Award at the Durbar Hall in the Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi. He was chosen to do live commentary of swearing-in-ceremony of Honourable President of India in 2017 for All India Radio. He is also a Radio Jockey with FM Rainbow Delhi. He was part of the chosen panel of anchors to present the Commemoration Ceremony of India's first National War Memorial, Delhi on 25 February 2019, graced by the honourable Prime Minister of India, Sh. Narendra Modi.
Broadcasting in the city of Chennai began in 1924 by the Madras Presidency Radio Club. The service was operational till the government-run All India Radio started broadcasting in the city in 1938.
Radio broadcasting began in India in 1922. The Government owned radio station All India Radio dominated broadcasting since 1936 but through privatization and deregulation has allowed commercial privately owned talk and music stations to reach large audiences.
Vijayawada, in India, has a well-developed communication and media infrastructure. It has a basic network of optical fiber cables. The city's telephone system is serviced by four landline companies: BSNL, Tata Indicom, Reliance and Airtel. There are a number of mobile-phone companies: Aircel, BSNL, Airtel, Uninor, MTS, Tata Indicom, Tata Docomo and Jio. Several companies offer broadband internet access.
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