Radio’s role highlighted
Speakers talked about the liberating effects of community radio.
ISLAMABAD: Community radio broadcasts content that is popular to or focuses on the needs of a specific audience, said Syed Abid Rizvi. The writer and former Station Director of Radio Pakistan said this while delivering a lecture on community radio at Civic Café programme of the Strengthening Participatory Organisation (SPO) on Sunday.
He said that various necessities gave birth to varieties of radio, of which community radio is a new addition. “It is an alien concept for the Pakistani society, but people should not be afraid of experimenting with it as it can have a liberating effect on the community.”
He said that as any other medium for mass communication, community radio can be put to harmful use. He said that loopholes in laws should be removed and a proper regulatory mechanism needs to be in place to monitor radio broadcasts.
In absence of such a mechanism illegal radios could emerge like that of Maulana Fazlullah’s in Swat. Currently, he said, Khyber Radio is being employed to counter extremist propaganda on radio by fundamentalists.
Chief of Program SPO Zafar Zeeshan said, “Radio is one of the most significant inventions having far-reaching influence on our worldview.”
He said radio was a prologue to the communication revolution that took place in latter centuries but it is disappointing that our society could not reap the benefits of this medium of communication.
Radio in the United States, in relation to population, experienced 29 per cent growth during 1950 — 1970, said Chief Executive SPO Naseer Memon. “This expansion did not lead to division of heterogeneous communities, rather it paved way for people to converge around common issues and interests.”
In his concluding remarks Memon said that our society needs to promote freedom of though. He said that people should not resist change nor should they be afraid of experimenting with new mediums.
The lecture was attended by renowned historian Dr Mubarak Ali, members of the civil society, students and teachers.
Source: The Express Tribune
Date:12/6/2010
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