[cr-india] ' TNAU plans to start six Community Radio Stations' - is this allowed/desirable?

[Vickram Crishna]

Instances of mismatch between a broadly expressed policy and its implementation through rules are many, and the redressal mechanism weak or as good as non-existent. If I am mistaken in my assessment, please tell me why the Supreme Court is not presently engaged with the implicit (imho, explicit) restrictions to constitutional freedom of speech in the manner in which the rules are framed? We have lived with this injustice for over a decade now, and it is business as usual.

As has been pointed out in this forum for many years now, the 'multiple' TX ban per license serves only to prevent rural people from using hybrid digital/analogue mixed media stations to deliver 'narrow' (efficient and targeted, very low power, very low cost) broadcasting of audio content wherever (and only wherever) needed, while the license approval mechanism tacitly sustains the hegemony of government controlled broadcasting, blatantly seen in the cases highlighted in this discussion. The inability of the ministry, TRAI, etc to 'see' this makes me feel that the technology advisers (if any) consulted on such matters deliberately leave their intelligence (and conscience) behind while rule-making.

For those who joined this list later, my favorite story from the last decade is the Adviser who solemnly informed me at a TRAI consultation that half of New York's 72FM stations work because they only broadcast underground for the subway. I am convinced now that this is exactly how all the rebel radio stations in disturbed areas work, since the government has not apparently heard anything about them.

Vickram

Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.mail.sarai.net/pipermail/cr-india_mail.sarai.net/attachments/20141213/2957bcd1/attachment.html>