[cr-india] Campus stations in Pakistan

[Arti Jaiman]

Campus radios or camp followers? By Aurangzaib Khan | DAWN.COM (4 hours ago) TodayJournalists at Radio KUST - Kohat University of Science and Technology - conducting a mock talk show. Photo by Aurangzaib Khan 

 What
 do you get if you cross a campus transmission with community broadcast 
that eschews journalism? A hybrid that may serve the state regulatory 
authority’s interests but is likely to lose sight of its core academic 
purpose.Whether the campus radios in Pakistani 
universities produce responsible radio-journalists or a crowd of 
complacent broadcasters, ala Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) and
 Pakistan Television Corporation (PTV), year after year depends largely 
on their news and information agenda. Judging from the Pakistan 
Electronic Media Regulatory Authority’s (Pemra) conditions allowing 
campus radios in private and public sector universities that leave very 
little room for critical independent views, the scale may be tipped in 
favour of the latter.A campus radio, by definition, is not a 
mouthpiece for the state but an academic tool free to pursue excellence 
in education and career. Or is it?Pemra brands campus radio as 
community radio with an academic thrust. Based at journalism schools, 
the radio caters to educational needs of students while also accounting 
for information needs of the campus community. Nothing wrong with it, 
until one notices that “educational needs” mean no independent news and 
information – political, critical or controversial – produced by 
journalism students in the course of training for a profession that will
 require them to cover exactly that.Among several Pemra 
parameters, one is that “the radio stations may broadcast local news and
 re-broadcast news and current affairs programmes of the national 
broadcasters i.e. the Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation and Pakistan 
Television Corporation.”The authority does not recognise that 
campus radio, as a tool to train journalism students, must produce its 
own independent news bulletins, current affairs programmes, interviews 
and discussions. More so, given that the stations are based in 
journalism schools and depend on students for content that aspires to 
professional excellence. By telling campus radios what to cover and not,
 Pemra negates a cardinal rule of journalism training: You can’t make a 
journalist indulge in self-censorship and expect her to excel in a 
profession that requires her to be truthful and objective.“Not 
covering real politics is against standard international practice of 
journalism and journalism education where you are required to cover real
 issues,” says Adnan Rehmat, head of the local media support 
organisation Intermedia. “Journalism students should be able to produce 
content like talk shows, interviews and current affairs programmes for 
radio and TV as part of their academic activities.”Pemra’s terms 
and conditions restrict production of such content. The authority grants
 a license to a university to establish and operate a non-commercial FM 
radio station of limited transmission capacity to cater to the academic 
needs of the students of the university, especially the department of 
journalism for what it calls “purely instructional programmes in 
education.”News and current affairs come naturally to good 
journalism. But torn between the choice to keep a radio station or lose 
it by pushing the boundaries of the state-defined role of campus radios 
as opposed to being a source of independent information and training for
 journalists, the campus radios in Pakistan may be caught in a hard 
place between duty and dereliction.“There are no restrictions on 
us from Pemra although there are rules and parameters within which we 
have to work,” says Dr Shahjehan Sayed, Chairperson Department of 
Journalism and Mass Communications at Peshawar University where the 
country’s first campus radio is based. “The rules for campus radio 
should be more relaxed than a regular radio station. There should be 
freedom of expression and free flow of ideas. The radio should become an
 intellectual forum, generating debate and encouraging critical 
thinking.”The governors in the provinces, appointed by the 
federal government, are chancellors of their respective universities 
that have campus radio stations. Their influence can go a long way in 
shaping the campus radio’s news and information policy. But this is 
where the Pemra comes in: Presumably to steer clear of political 
controversies, to protect national interest and eschew content that 
could spark conflict.Universities in Pakistan have always been 
prone to politics, religious dogma and conflict, but should that keep 
authorities from giving students and academic institutions a fair chance
 to pursue higher professional standards and become centers of 
excellence by limiting the potential of professionals and the tools to 
train them?Lack of established university practices like 
maintaining close contact with radio stations and business concerns who 
can solicit services of students for research, surveys and marketing 
trends is also an issue. There is no regular forum for taking in interns
 and fresh graduates from journalism schools or other professional 
institutions as in developed countries.“Absence of mechanisms for
 institutional interaction with press clubs such as membership of press 
clubs and journalist unions’ mars journalism education in Pakistan,” 
says Rehmat. “In good universities, journalism students and schools 
cultivate close ties with such institutions and students become members 
quite early in their career. In Pakistan, media unions are not strong 
and nobody pays attention to journalism students.”In order to 
broaden the news and information agenda of campus radio, media experts 
advise against treating the a radio station as a property of the 
journalism schools and Pemra.In major public-sector universities 
that have campus radios, the stations have become battlegrounds for turf
 war between a possessive administration and the journalism schools.  
Although the use of a radio facility for a journalism school comes 
first, it needs not be restricted to that alone. It could involve staff 
and students from any and all disciplines of the university benefiting 
industry and community through diverse content.Having a board of 
directors comprising chairpersons of different disciplines would 
encourage students from other departments such as international 
relations, political science, and economics etcetera to participate in 
campus radio activities and diversify its content. Similarly, it would 
add up to content if students from journalism schools report on 
activities of other departments.“When we restrict a campus radio 
to journalism schools, we isolate the audience that is not the 
university alone but anyone living within the reach of the radio,” says 
Rehmat. “Students don’t come from university campus alone but from all 
over the town and can bring their unique perspectives and stories from 
where they live. By restricting campus radio to campus activities alone,
 we isolate our listeners from outside and lose potential sources of 
news and information.”Practical journalism at campus radio to 
complement theoretical knowledge is an argument with obvious merits. 
What is not clear though is how journalism schools mean to use this 
facility to produce good journalists, given the limits imposed by 
regulatory laws and the university administrations that tow the policy 
line.The writer is a senior award-winning journalist based in Peshawar and has also worked extensively in the development and uplift sector in KP and FATA.

Arti Jaiman

Station Director : Gurgaon Ki Awaaz Samudayik Radio Station 107.8 MHz FM
email: arti at trfindia.org
website: www.trfindia.org 

Gurgaon Ki Awaaz is the first and only civil-society-led community radio station in the National Capital Region of Delhi. We broadcast 24X7, in Hindi and Haryanvi, with a team of community reporters, generating community content, and community participation. 
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