Saturday, June 06, 2009

Community Radio Station to Start at T. Pudupatty, Madurai District, Tamil

Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India has signed a Grant of Permission Agreement for establishing, maintaining and operating a Community Radio Station at T. Pudupatty, Thirumangalam Taluk, Madurai District, Tamil Nadu by People's Association for Rural Development (PARD). Letter of Intent had been issued to the Society after recommendations of Inter Ministerial Committee and seeking requisite clearances from various Ministries. The Community Radio Station is expected to be operational within three months as per the agreement.People's Association for Rural Development (PARD) is a registered Society registered under Societies Registrations Act 1975(Tamil Nadu Act 27 of 1975) on 28.11.1988. The main objective of the Society is to impart education in health, social awareness, agriculture, promote functional education, legal education and cultural development of the villages, environment and rural sanitation to the rural people, to undertake constructive activities for the welfare of socially and economically backward women, children and family on voluntary self help and democratic basis.The People's Association for Rural Development (PARD) had conducted a survey across 59 villages in four taluks of T. Pudupatty, Thirumangalam Taluk, Madurai District, Tamil Nadu about the need for setting up CRS and the requirements of targeted population. It was noted that out of 708 respondents, 83.05% of the population did not receive any newspaper. 61% of the respondents believe that radio can help them solve the major problems they are facing. 66.7% radio owners tuned to FM Channels. This pointed to the dire need of a Community Radio which employs local language and dialect to attract a new generation of listeners if a Radio revival is to be achieved. Besides the language and content, people feel that if they have the ownership of media, the possibility of the radio revival will increase enormously.The Ministry encourages setting up the Community Radio Stations as it promises to provide an opportunity to the local communities to express themselves, share their views and particularly empower the women, youth and the marginalized groups to take part in local self-governance and overall socio-economic and cultural development of the area. It will also better inform the society about the developmental initiatives of Government and promote transparency in the implementation of the scheme.
(Press Information Bureau, Govt of India)]

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