History of Radio

Unit-1
History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• Radio originated in the West. An experimental
physicist at Cambridge, James Clerk Maxwell
(1831-79), made the prediction way back in
1864.
• Twenty four years later, in 1888 to be precise,
the German Physicist Heinrich Hertz (1857-94)
demonstrated the existence and propagation
(travel through a medium) of these radio
waves
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• The New Zealand born British Physicist Ernest Rutherford
(1871 - 1937) succeeded in sending radio signals through
a distance of 3 1/4 of a mile. Another Englishman, Oliver
Lodge (1851 -1940) discovered and devised the
principles of tuning.
• The first ever radio was called the "wireless telegraph. It
did not have the capacity to transmit any form of sound.
• On August 14, 1894 the first public demonstration of
wireless telegraphy was conducted by Professor Oliver
Lodge and Alexander Muirhead
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• After a year, another scientist Alexander Stepanovich Popov built
his first radio receiver. This receiver was created on the basis of
Lodge's receiver with the aim of finding out an improved
product and it contained a coherer. And it was Guglielmo
Marconi (1874-1937), the Italian physicist and electrical
engineer, who made use of the knowledge of radio waves and
invented the wireless telegraphy as a device of communication.
• Guglielmo Marconi part from this, Marconi also has the credit of
establishing something very historic. On the Isle of Wight,
England, he established the world's first radio station in 1897.
He also opened the world's first "wireless" factory in Hall Street,
Chelmsford, England in 1898, and deputed around 50 people.
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• The first vacuum tube was made in 1903 by John
Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945), an Englishman. Fleming’s
vacuum tube was called a diode. Within a diode, there
are two electrical parts: an anode and a cathode.
• Two years later Lee De Forest (1873-1961), an American
improved upon Fleming’s vacuum tube and invented a
triode or audion. A triode has three electrical parts. An
anode, a cathode and a control grid. There are tetrodes
and pentodes: of four and five electrical parts also in
use.
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• 1906, when the first successful radio program broadcast
was carried out by Reginald Fessenden, from Ocean Bluff-
Brant Rock, Massachusetts. On that day Fessenden played
‘O Holy Night’ on the violin and read a passage from the
Bible which was heard on the radio by the ships at the sea.
• In 1920, an American Westinghouse Company engineer,
Dr. Frank Conrad, began a series of voice broadcast. He
also arranged for the sale of radio sets. In the same year
another official of Westinghouse built a broadcasting
station at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Broadcasting had
come to stay.
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• 1920 was another important year in the history of
radio. Sociedad Radio Argentina has the credit of
broadcasting the first live performance through radio.
At 9 pm on August 27 it aired a live performance of
Richard Wagner's Parsifal opera from the Coliseo.
• August 31, station 8MK in Detroit, Michigan started
broadcasting the first ever radio news bulletin On the
other hand the first campus radio station began
broadcasting on October 14 from Union College,
Schenectady, New York in the same year
 History of Radio Broadcasting (World
Scenario)
• In 1930s, a very important development took place in the field of
broadcasting, when Edwin H. Armstrong invented the FM radio.
FM radio could overcome the interference (static) problem of AM
radio and hence it gained popularity. Moreover stations could be
placed at a greater distance for greater fidelity.
• In the early 1930s, the amateur radio operators invented single
sideband and frequency modulation which became established
commercial modes by the end of the decade.
• Earlier in 1920s, radio was used to transmit visible pictures as
television does today. But it was not until the 1940s when North
America and Europe viewed the commercial transmissions of
television.
 Pre-Independence
1. Nov. 1923 – First radio club in Calcutta
2. 16 May 1924 – Radio club in Madras
3. 23 July 1927 – Bombay station
4. 26 August 1927 – Calcutta radio station
5. 15 July 1927 – First radio program journal “The India
Radio’
6. 1930 – Indian broadcasting company handover Bombay
station to government. It was renamed as ISBS (Indian
State Broadcasting Station).
7. 8 July 1936 – It renamed as AIR (All India Radio)
 History of Radio in India
• Broadcasting in India actually began about 13 years
before AIR came into existence.
• In June 1923 the Radio Club of Bombay made the first
ever broadcast in the country.
• This was followed by the setting up of the Calcutta
Radio Club five months later.
• Radio Broadcasting was pioneered in India by the
Madras Presidency Radio Club in 1924.
• The Club worked a broadcasting service for three years
 Pre-Independence
• 1926 – Indian Broadcasting Company (IBC) – private company given
permission to set up 2 stations
 July 23, 1927 – Bombay station set up
 August 26, 1927 – Calcutta station followed
 Only 3000 licensed radio owners then
• The Indian Broadcasting Company (IBC) came into being on July 23,
1927, only to face liquidation in less than three years.
• In April 1930, the Indian Broadcasting Service, under the Department
of Industries and Labour, commenced its operations on an
experimental basis.
• In 1932 the Government of India took over broadcasting.
• A separate department known as Indian Broadcasting Service was
opened.
 Pre-Independence
• The 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
• Lionel Fielden was appointed the first Controller of
Broadcasting in August 1935. In the following month
Akashvani Mysore, a private radio station was set up.
• On June 8, 1936, the Indian State Broadcasting Service
became All India Radio.
 Pre-Independence
• The Central News Organisation (CNO) came into existence in August, 1937.
• October 1, 1939 - External Service started and directed to Afghanistan, Iran
and Arab countries in Pushtu (to counter radio propaganda from Germany)
• 1939 - Controller Broadcasting Lionel Fielden was succeeded by Professor
A.S. Bokhari who remained the head of All India Radio for six crucial years
(In 1943, the designation, Controller of Broadcasting, was changed to
Director General)
• In the same year, AIR came under the Department of Communications and
four years later came under the Department of Information and
Broadcasting.
• When India attained independence, there were six radio stations in India,
at Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta, Madras, Tiruchirapalli and Lucknow.
 Post -Independence
1. 1952 – National program of music started
2. 2 Oct. 1957 – Vividh Bharti launched
3. 1967 – Commercials on AIR was started
4. 23 July 1969 – Yuv vani launched
5. 1976 – Doordarshan delinked from AIR (Chanda Committee 1964-66)
6. 1974 – Sky radio channel concept launched. The enable subscribers to receive 20 radio channels
via satellite on FM receivers.
7. 1977 – First FM service launched in Madras
8. Mid 1980s – Phone in program were experimented in Delhi, Pune and other cities
9. 1988 – National channel launched
10.1990s – AIR on network of 219 centers, including 32 Vividh Bharti/ commercial station, 73 local
countries, 114 regional channel. Over 6 radio sets were in rural households. AIR 300 news
bulletins every day in national, regional and external services in different language.
11.1992 – FM broadcast started in Jalandhar
12.1993 – Privatization of FM
13.15 August 1993 – FM channel launched in Bombay by Times FM
14.1997 – Prasar Bharti came into existence
15.1998 – AIR news on telephone and AIR radio on internet. Till now AIR covers 90% of
geographical area and 97% population
 Post -Independence
• All India Radio (also known as Akashvani) operates this service,
over a network of broadcasting stations located all over the
country.
• At the time of Independence AIR had a coverage of just 2.5 % of
the area and 11% of the population.
• As a national service, catering to the complex needs of a vast
country.
• All India Radio seeks to represent in its national and regional
programmes, the attitudes, aspirations and attainments of all
Indian people and attempts to reflect, as fully and faithfully as
possible, the richness of the Indian scene and the reach of the
Indian mind.
 Post -Independence
• By 1939, in addition to the existing medium wave transmitters, short wave
transmitters had also been Installed at Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.
New stations with medium wave transmitters were opened at Lucknow and
Tiruchiraplli.
• In 1941, AIR was again transferred to the department of Information and
Broadcasting, which after Independence in 1947, became a separate ministry
by itself.
• BBC steps in – Fielden and Bokhari reorganise BBC broadcasts to suit Indian
sensibilities .
• 1940 – Shows for Indian troops (WW-2 around the corner)
• 1940 - Bokhari began broadcasting a daily ten minute Hindustani news
commentary. Soon, programmes in Gujarati, Marathi, Bengali, Pushtu, Sindhi,
Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam followed.
 Post -Independence
• When Japan joined WW-2 in 1941, thus began
AIR's Burmese, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Malay
and the Indo-Chinese languages broadcasts.
(Today, AIR broadcasts in 16 foreign
languages) .
• 1947 - total number of radio sets at that time
was about 275,000.
 Post -Independence
• At the time of Independence, 9 AIR stations (also including
Peshawar, Lahore and Dhaka) Sardar Vallabhai Patel was the first
Minister of Information and Broadcasting in Independent India.
• AIR stations in Delhi, Madras, Bombay, Calcutta, Lucknow and
Tiruchirapalli.
• Bahujana hitaya bahujana sukhaya ( For the benefit of many and
the happiness of many)
• Emphasis on disseminating information, education, music and
drama.
• 1952 – Vadya Vrinda or National Orchestra with Pandit Ravi
Shankar as the first music conductor.
 Post -Independence
• In the 50s, Minister for Information and
Broadcasting Dr. B.V. Keskar, put a ban on
broadcast of Hindi film songs on AIR.
• Radio Ceylon became immensely popular.
Binaca Geetmala and Amin Sayani.
• 1957 – Vividh Bharti started. Emphasis
shifted to entertainment.
 Post -Independence
• Vividh Bharti extended to Medium Wave which meant more
listenership.
• 1956- AIR officially called Akashvani.
• 1959 – Satellite Television introduced which later separated to form
Doordarshan.
• 1957 – Rural Radio Forums
• Arrival of Transistor – Low cost and mobile.
• 1964 – Indira Gandhi becomes Minister of I&B.
• Chanda committee
• In 1967, Vividh Bharti was commercialized.
• In 1976, AIR and Doordarshan were separated.
• Prasar Bharati Act.
 AIR Network
• Starting with 6 broadcasting stations in 1947, the AIR
today has a network of 82 broadcasting stations. The 82
radio stations, grouped into five zones, are the following:
• North Zone: Ajmer, Allahabad, Aligarh, Bikancr, Delhi,
Gorakhpur, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Jullundur, Lucknow, Mathura,
Rampur, Simla, Udaipur and Varanasi
• East Zone: Agartala, Aizawl, Bhagalpur, Calcutta, Cuttack,
Dibrugarh. Gauhati, Imphal, Jeypore, Kohima, Kurseong,
Ranchi, Pasighat, Patna, Sambalpur, Shillong, Silchar,
Siliguri, Tawang and Tezu ;
 AIR Network
• West Zone : Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Bhuj, Bombay,
Gwalior, Indore. Jabalpur, Nagpur, Panaji, Parbani,
Pune, Raipur, Rajkot and Sangli;
• South Zone: Alleppey, Bangalore, Bhadravati,
Calicut, Coimbatore, Cuddapah, Dharwar; Gulbarga,
Hyderabad, Madras, Mysore, Pondicherry, Port Blair,
Tiruchirappalli, Tirunelveli, Trichur, Trivandrum.
• Vijayawada and Vishakhapatnam; and Kashmir Zone:
Jammu, Leh and Srinagar.
 AIR Network
• In addition, there are three auxiliary studio centers
at Vado- dara, Darbhanga and Shantiniketan
• Two VividhBharati/commercial centers, one at
Chandigarh and the other at Kanpur.
• These cover all the important cultural and
linguistic regions of the country.
• The expansion of the broadcasting facility
remained limited till independence.
• India's broadcasting network would cover 89 per
cent of the population.
 AIR Network
• Till the end of 1976 radio licenses had reached a colossal figure of
nearly 1.74 crores, which fetched revenue of Rs. 23.51 crores.
• Today the radio network has spread to the remote corners of India.
• It is now possible to bring sense of unity not only political but also
cultural among the diverse traditions that enrich our land.

AIR's programme pattern combines three main elements:

a) A national channel providing programmes of countrywide interest
and significance,
b) A zonal service from each of the four metropolitan centers (Delhi,
Bombay, Calcutta and Madras); and
c) Regional services from individual stations each catering to the
needs and interests of its respective area.
 AIR Network

• The principal ingredients of AIR's programme

 Music
 Spoken Word
 Dramas
 Features
 News and Current Affairs
 Commentaries and Discussion

• VividhBharati and its Commercial Service

 Farm and Home Broadcasts,
 Programmes for Special Audiences (like Youth, Women, Children, Industrial
Workers and Tribal Population),
 Programmes for Overseas Listeners broadcast in the External Services.
 AIR Network
• To enable AIR to reach all sections of the Indian people, its
programmes in the Home Service are broadcast in 20
principal languages.
• In addition, the External Services of AIR beam their
programmes to listeners all over the world in over 24
languages
• New Services: The News Services Division of AIR
through its central and regional: News bulletins, current
affairs, commentaries and discussions provides accurate
objective speedy comprehensive coverage of news to
listeners at home and abroad. The news agencies and the
monitoring services, AIR has a total of 206 correspondents
 AIR Network
EXTERNAL SERVICES:
• AIR made its first broadcast to listeners
outside India on October, 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.
 AIR Network
VIVIDHBHARATI:
• A self-contained service of popular entertainment, known as
Vividh Bharati 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 VividhBharati 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). Bhopal, Indore, Cuttack,
Jaipur, Jodhpur, Patna, Ranchi and Trivandrum (1975).
 AIR Network
• VividhBharati, an alternative national service of All
India Radio, now forms a part of the Central Sales Unit
of the Commercial Broadcasting Service.
• The total duration of broadcasts of the VividhBharati
service is now 12 hours 45 minutes, on week days and
13 hours 20 minutes on Sundays and holidays.
• The network covers 29 full-fledged centers and seven
partial centers.
• VividhBharati is also radiated through two powerful
short-wave transmitters from Delhi, Bombay and
Madras.
 AIR Network
National Programme:
• 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.
• It has helped in a better understanding of the two
systems prevalent in the North and the South.
• The medium of the drama is utilized for popularizing
the Economic Programme.
• A special series of short plays on various themes
including the Economic Programme, Family Planning,
Dowry and anti-Casteism are regularly broadcast.
 AIR Network
• The most significant achievement of AIR in the field
of Radio drama is its National Programme of Plays.
• Once a month an outstanding play from one of the
main Indian languages is selected and translated into
all the other regional languages of the country,
broadcast simultaneously by all stations in their
respective regional languages.
• All India Radio instituted in 1975 the annual
Akashvani Awards for plays, features, music, youth
programmes etc.
 AIR Network
• 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.
 AIR Programmes
The Special Programmes include programmes
1. Women (once a week)
2. Children (two or three times a week)
3. The armed forces (daily)
4. Industrial Workers (4 days in a week)
5. Hill tribes in their own dialects which number around 135 for
rural audiences and consist of plays, skits, agriculture and other
matters (twice a week)
6. Programmes on Family Planning in all the National languages
and in important dialects, as often as possible.
 AIR Programmes
• Programmes for the youth in YuvaVani are
broadcast from Calcutta, 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.
 AIR Growth
• A major development took place in 1976, when AIR was finally
de-linked from Doordarshan, and brought under the purview of
the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, and radio was
free to take off on its own rather than being referred to as
television’s ‘poor cousin’. AIR underwent rapid development
over the course of 3 decades, and by 2008, it comprised of a
countrywide network consisting of 219 centres. It is now one of
the largest radio news organisations of the world, and
broadcasts over 300 news bulletins and a variety of
programmes through its services, catering to over 97% of the
population of India, including both urban as well as rural areas.
 Growth of Radio
• In 1995, AIR decided to open FM stations to
private players. Path of Indian Radio then
veered towards:
• First Phase - 1999
• Second Phase – 2006
• Third Phase – 2010-2015
 First Phase
• Auctioning of FM bands to Private stations begins
• 21 stations commissioned across 12 cities including New Delhi,
Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Lucknow
and Jaipur.
• 108 radio frequencies put up by the Government across 40 cities.
• Stations to pay OTEF (One-Time Entry Fees) for 10 years.
• Licenses for Community Radio also given
• Radio Mirchi amongst the first private FM stations set up by
The Times Group.
• India’s first Private FM station came up in Bangalore.
 Second Phase
• 338 frequencies for radio stations 91 cities were on block
• The government awards 280 licenses for a total sum of $205
million
• Sun, Adlabs, HT Music, ENIL emerge as the leaders with
nationwide footprint
• Government introduces new revenue sharing model
• The Phase-II bidding process attracted greater interest compared
with the first phase in 1999. Phase I participants, such as New
Delhi-based Living Media India Limited and Mumbai-based
Midday Multimedia Limited popularized FM in large metropolitan
cities and paved the way for Phase II
 Third Phase
• The e-auction of first batch of private FM radio phase III for 135
frequencies across 69 cities culminated with the ministry of information
and broadcasting declaring the results on 16 September,2015. Even as
38 frequencies remained unsold at the end of the auction, it only means
growth for the radio industry. The government earned close to Rs 3,000
crores from the process, which also included migration fee from the
stations that chose to move from phase II to III. FM Phase II,
introduced in 2005, saw 243 FM channels becoming operational in 86
cities.  
 Conclusion
• With the advent of the internet and other platforms
termed as ‘New media’, however, the radio has
become almost obsolete among many sections of
the population. However, its simplicity and the
ease with which it can be accessed and used has
ensured that it is still embedded in the daily lives
of a number of people, and it will be long before
the radio, with its chat shows, news, entertainment
and light-hearted programmes, loses its salience.
 Links
• https://www.indianfolk.com/history-journey-r
adio-broadcasting-edited/
• Read more at:
https://www.campaignindia.in/article/fm-radi
o-phase-iii-what-it-could-mean-for-advertisers
/423531