24 hour private FM news channels in India cleared by ICE

Information, Communication and Entertainment (ICE) Committee says okay to news on private radio channels; Indian Govt. still worried.

BY A CORRESPONDENT

6 February 2006
MUMBAI, INDIA

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Information, Communication and Entertainment (ICE) Committee, a media advisory group which met on January 31, have cleared a proposal for 24 hour private FM news channels in India, and said that they have no problem with the FM radio news. Currently, 24 hour news broadcasts on private FM channels is banned in India, barring weather bulletins, stocks news and local traffic reports.

The ICE, which comprises senior Indian bureaucrats and some key media persons including Kiran Karnik of NASSCOM, film director Shekhar Kapoor and Kunal Dasgupta of Sony looked at several issues apart from the contentious FM one. Other items on the agenda included whether India a Media Commission, a new censorship board for television and a broadcast regulatory authority. It will also debate whether media monopolies are good for this country.

While the clearance on FM news by the ICE is far from the Indian government actually allowing private radio channels to air news and current affairs, it is being seen as a positive step towards not only freer media, but also more financially viable radio channels. The ban on news and the capping of foreign investment at 20 per cent (under the RBI guideline) has led to radio becoming a non-profit venture. Only All India Radio (AIR) is permitted to air news and current affairs programming, and while AIR news is dominated by state-level news, there is hardly any local news that might be of interest and use to people in different parts of the country. Most AIR bulletins carry local bulletins running into a maximum of five minutes a day.

The case for allowing private radio channels in India to carry news and current affairs is strengthened by the fact that private television channels are already allowed to do so. Thus existing governmental fears that lifting the ban will give too much control and power to the media seems unfounded. In the face of tremendous demand for local news on the radio, allowing news on radio channels would definitely aid the financially beleaguered private FM radio stations. Currently, only 22 stations are actually on air in 12 cities despite the government having allotted 108 frequencies in 40 cities, leading to a huge loss of revenue for the government as well as a loss in terms of access to non-statist information to people in Punjab, Bihar, Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and the entire North-East where not a single private channel has been established.

The ICE is being seen by many quarters as a subtle way of devising new and more insidious gags for the media, the beginning of a long process of regulating the growing clout of the media. However depending on how the process of regulation is carried out, this could become a positive step towards liberalizing the first mechanism in history that reached a mass audience.