All India Radio Transmitter to be Shut Down After Dec 31

The All India Radio's (AIR) transmitter, the national radio broadcaster of India will completely be shut down after December 31. The centre has provided services to a large geographical area but now the listeners will be deprived from the services as the programmes will now be run under a FM channel and in the mobile application.

The AM service in the medium wave is providing services in around 200 kilometer area and the FM services reaches around 40-50 kilometer area which means the FM service will not reach entire listeners. On the other hand, not all people in the rural areas have smart phones to listen to FM or in the mobile application. This means, the thousands of listeners of medium wave which is providing services since 73 years will now be limited.

According to reports, the rate of the transmitter to provide AM services has been increased and therefore it has been decided that 6 transmitters will be closed down.

All India Radio is the largest radio network in the world, and one of the largest broadcasting organisations in the world in terms of the number of languages broadcast and the spectrum of socio-economic and cultural diversity it serves. AIR's home service comprises 420 stations located across the country, reaching nearly 92% of the country's area and 99.19% of the total population. AIR originates programming in 23 languages and 179 dialects.

People from the rural areas eagerly wait for the 'Mann ki Baat' programme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi which is aired on All India Radio and with the handing over of the radio station into an FM channel, the rural people will be disconnected as the FM channels doesn't get network in those areas. That is, the rural people will not be able to listen to 'Mann Ki Baat' anymore. The question is hasn't the government want these people to listen to Mann ki Baat aired in All India Radio or has they thought of any other programmes.

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