Salem: India’s largest public radio broadcaster, All India Radio (water), has decided to change the four ‘primary channel stations’ on the Tamil Nadu radio station and Puducherry to the ‘Relay Station’ from October 3, triggering concerns about the possibility of their shutdown.
Henceforth, these five stations will deliver programs that are mostly produced by Chennai air stations and can lose their local flavors.
According to a letter sent to the Additional Director General (ADG Content Operation) by Saradha Jambunathan, Head of the Program, Air, Chennai, a meeting was held in Chennai on September 3 to draw a fixed fixed point chart (FPC) for six.
Primary Chennai, Madurai, Coimbatore, Trichy, and Tirunelveli Station stations at TN and Puducherry Stations.
All of these main channel stations will have a uniform transmission clock pattern, and regional news and the central language bulletin will be combined into a long news bulletin both for morning and night transmissions, the letter said.
The letter also said the interactive chunks of the film would be included to add income, the English news bulletin relay would be rationalized to suit local requirements, and the station might have Windows for local variations in the morning and evening.
“Local relay stations such as NalPalli in the Dharmapuri and Yercaud districts in Salem Regency, Nagercoil in Kankumumari Regency, and in Puducherry will have the option to join state networks depending on their needs,” said the letter.
T Suriya Prabu, the fan of the Salem district, said Prasar Bharati might have taken the first step to end the radio station in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry by stopping their independent operations in the big district.
“Employees from the primary channel station may be immediately dismissed by quoting zero income,” he said.
According to air employees, the main radio station has autonomy to produce local programs on all problems including agriculture.
They also told listeners about local events and made important announcements.
These programs have local taste and are produced in regional dialects, said Suriya Prabu.
“This will be lost if the program is delivered from Chennai,” he said.
Pointing on a letter issued by the North-Zone Adg Shashi Kant on December 12, 2020, Prabu said Prasar Bharati had taken a similar step in the zone, which included Assam, but turned it back after protest by locals.
“Instead of turning it into a relay station, Prasar Bharati can turn it into a FM station to generate better income,” he said.