[cr-india] cr in nepal

[sajan venniyoor]

In her column in The Hindu ('Media Matters', Feb 13, 2005), Sevanti Ninan gives a bleak picture of the clampdown on Nepal's media, and how it has hit their community radio stations as well. 

She writes, "Even as a popular weekly newspaper was describing the condition of trees on Kathmandu's streets,... and Radio Sagarmatha, the first community radio station in South Asia, was reduced to playing music, the country's journalists were monitoring the silenced phone lines for odd pockets of time when they would suddenly spring to life for an hour or so." 

"India has no community radio worth the name thanks to government paranoia and public indifference. Nepal had 54 stations that have sprouted over the last seven years. And only the villages which received these and community radio enthusiasts in South Asia know just what it means to have these suddenly snuffed out, as happened last week. There have been conflicting reports: one version says they have all been closed except Radio Sagarmatha, another says they are alive but reduced to only playing music."

Sajan.

"Lessons from Nepal", 
Media Matters - Sevanti Ninan
The Hindu, Sunday, Feb 13, 2005
http://www.hindu.com/mag/2005/02/13/stories/2005021300420300.htm

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