Odisha’s community radio stations help grass roots tune in to democracy

Koraput: At first glance, the bright yellow building with walls sporting beautiful tribal art, located in Chhapar village of Koraput district, does not give away any indication of the activities going on inside. Stepping in, however, one finds a well-equipped broadcasting studio and two young men ready in front of microphones to explain the dos and don’ts of voting in the local dialects of Desia and Paraja. Welcome to Radio Dhimsa, named after a tribal dance and southern Odisha’s first community radio station.
The excitement here is no less than in a newsroom or television studio. Inaugurated in 2008 by South Orissa Voluntary Action (Sova), Radio Dhimsa is one of the 17 community radio stations or ‘goshti betar kendras’ functioning in the state at present. Broadcasting at 90.4 Mhz, it reaches out to around 60 villages in Koraput and Lamtaput blocks, including Koraput municipality, and with just days to go before the tribal-reserved Koraput Lok Sabha seat votes on April 11, the station has added programmes on elections to its community-aimed interventions in health, children’s issues and agriculture.

“With help from the Election Commission (EC) we are working on a programme called ‘Festival of Democracy’. We have recorded around six episodes already on topics such as ‘know your candidate’, ‘what is Nota’, ‘awareness on EVM’, ‘what is a manifesto’ and ‘what happens at the polling station on polling day’,” said Sova secretary Sanjit Patnayak, adding that the station also organized community events to improve voter awareness and electoral literacy, including teaching people how to find their names and polling stations from the voters’ list. Radio Dhimsa has around 120 listeners' clubs, each having 15 members.

The station in-charge of Radio Dhimsa, Sachida Mohanty, added, “In this tribal belt, voter turnout has traditionally been high. But in villages close to the district headquarters town of Koraput, people don’t even know what an election issue is, they don’t know their candidates or how to choose one over the other. We help fill that gap.”

“We use various formats to get our message across. For example, we have a radio drama called ‘Mama and Bhanji’, in which we put forward information in the form of a question and answer session between an uncle and his niece. We present the manifestoes of parties in the form of songs,” Mohanty said. “Besides, we interview key members of the community, like naiks and sarpanchs, as well as members of the panchayati raj association,” he explained.

What makes this work more relevant is that the audience of Radio Dhimsa has little access to any other form of media, especially one that talks to them in their own language. “Unlike the AIR station in Jeypore, which broadcasts in Odia, we use Paraja and Desia to reach out to the people. The dialect is locally used and understood by both non-tribals and tribals who comprise 50 per cent of the population here,” Patnayak said, adding that the station plans to broadcast the election results on May 23.

Aware of community radio’s importance in ensuring participatory democracy, the Election Commission held a poll-themed workshop for them in February and March. Seven stations from Odisha – Radio Surabhi (Daspalla), Radio Swayam Shakti (Khariar), Radio Swaraj (Jajpur), Radio Namaskar (Konark), Radio Muskan (Kandhamal), Radio Dhimsa (Koraput) and Radio Bulbul (Bhadrak) – were trained in EC-organized sessions in Delhi and Hyderabad. The coverage of these stations ranges from 10 to 25 km.

On being asked what makes community radio stations different from the public broadcaster or private FM channels, Shishir Das, president of the Community Radio Association of Odisha and chairman of Radio Surabhi in Dasapalla, Nayagarh, said the service is unbiased in nature and unlike most other media outlets in the state are not run by persons with political influence.

“Our overhead costs are low and most community radio stations are supported by NGOs. We are not yet dependent on advertisements, and we can give a voice to the voiceless in an unbiased manner. Our doors are open, anyone can walk in and say what they have to,” he said. Radio Surabhi, which also broadcasts at 90.4 MHz, touches Daspalla assembly segment, under Kandhamal Lok Sabha seat.

Also making waves this election is Radio Namaskar, set up in 2010 by NGO Young India at Konark in Puri district. Its chairman and national president of Community Radio Association, India, N A Shah Ansari, explained that Radio Namaskar’s coverage touches two parliamentary seats (Puri and Jagatsinghpur) and four assembly seats (Satyabadi, Nimapada, Kakatpur and Puri).

“The limited coverage means we have fewer candidates to interview; the debate is much more intense. We allow our audience to place their grievances before candidates. This is not possible in bigger media,” Ansari said, adding that Radio Namaskar broadcast in Odia and Telugu for the sizeable migrant population in and around Puri.