Community radio on wheel
SAJAN VENNIYOOR
05 July 2006
UP in the hills of Kothmale, about 25 kilometres
southwest
of Kandy in the central province of Sri
Lanka, a strange vehicle can be seen
sputtering along
the dirt tracks of the villages. At first glance, it
is
an autorickshaw or tuktuk, a familiar sight on the
roads of South Asia and as
common on the streets of
Sri Lanka as sarongs.
But this is no ordinary vehicle. This is eTukTuk, the
world's first
radio-station and multimedia centre on
three wheels.
In 1982, when the Mahaweli irrigation project
displaced thousands of
villagers in central Sri Lanka,
the government eased their resettlement by
setting up
several community radio projects in and around the
new
villages. The Kothmale Community Radio (KCR) came up
in 1989 and went
on to become something of a legend
where the other `community radio' stations
soon ran
into rough weather
On the walls of the somewhat run-down building that
houses the KCR and a
multimedia centre, there are old,
faded photographs of a slim, curly-haired
young man in
a sarong, deep in conversation with local people.
Sunil
Wijesinghe, now the Station Controller of KCR,
is still the most unassuming
of men, as likely to grab
a pickaxe as a microphone and turn his hand
to
whatever odd job that needs to be done around the
station.
The radio station, KCR 98.4 FM, which is part of the
cash-strapped Sri
Lanka Broadcasting Corporation, runs
on a shoestring budget. Sunil and his
team keep things
going with a blend of ingenuity and good humour.
The
studio is a marvel of improvisation. The mixer is of
venerable
antiquity, as are the spool recorders. The
acoustic treatment on the walls
seems to consist of
old foam-covered coir mattresses.
The only pieces of modern broadcast equipment visible
were a Compact Disc
player and a Personal Computer
donated by UNESCO. There is just one
multi-purpose
studio, and programmes have to be recorded when the
station
shuts down between transmissions. A second
booth - now a storage room is
awaiting conversion into
a production studio. When? "As soon as funds
are
available," says Sunil Wijesinghe, echoing a common
refrain in
Kothmale.
Next only to Sunil, Benjamin (`Mr. Ben') Grubb is one
of the minor marvels
of Kothmale. Ben is a slim,
bespectacled Australian in his late twenties,
whose
air of detached abstraction hides a sharp intellect
and a passion
for all things technical. Ben Grubb came
to Sri Lanka as a tourist and
"somehow ended up" at
Kothmale, where he is the Project Adviser and
guiding
spirit behind the eTukTuk project. He handpicked the
heavy-duty
battery, inverter, mixer, amplifier, cables
and all the other odds and ends
that fit snugly into
the tuktuk.
When the project runs out of funds - an all too common
occurrence - Ben
reportedly dips into his own
resources to keep things ticking. "My
girlfriend
supports me," he deadpans.
The eTukTuk was unveiled in Colombo during the World
Press Freedom Day
conference in May this year. The
bright blue three-wheeler with its Heath
Robinson
interior was an instant hit. A few days later, the
AMARC (World
Association of Community Radio
Broadcasters) round table discussion on
`Community
Radio and its Social Impact' was covered live by the
eTukTuk in
Colombo.
"With this eTukTuk, it seems to me you've got a great
vehicle both in the
physical and the symbolic sense,
to go out to the communities and the
neighbourhoods
and to let people speak through their community
radio
station," said Steve Buckley, president of AMARC. "I
think that this
is a trend that is going to catch on."
The vehicle is an Indian-built Bajaj RE 4-stroke
autorickshaw,
powerful enough to climb the steep hills
of Kothmale while carrying what is,
in effect, a
complete radio station and multimedia centre, and a
couple of
operators as well. Ben said the
three-wheeler was stripped down and rebuilt
to his
specifications by local mechanics, with special racks
for the
equipment. The roof rack - sturdy enough to
support Ben's weight - holds two
speakers.
BEN GRUBB
BEN SHOWS DALIT children from Weliganga the
converted
autorickshaw, complete with laptop, inverter,
amplifier, mixer,
a CDMA phone, scanner, camera and
battery-operated printer
There is a shelf for the laptop, and space to mount a
CDMA (code division
multiple access) phone, scanner,
camera and battery-operated printer. Even in
the
remotest villages of Kothmale, with the eTukTuk one
can access the
Internet, scan and upload documents,
download files, print them and take
digital
photographs. A portable 1000-watt generator produces
enough
electricity to recharge the main battery and
keep the equipment running for
hours.
When I reached Kothmale on May 10, the eTukTuk was in
its lair - a
converted kitchen in the KCR building -
having completed the 150-odd km from
Colombo to
Kothmale. But there was work to be done - a field
broadcast was
scheduled that evening, the eTukTuk's
first community OB (Outdoor Broadcast)
event in
Kothmale, at Weliganga village.
Weliganga (`river-flats') clings to a hillside a few
kilometres downhill
from KCR. As the eTukTuk rolled
into a small clearing with a dilapidated shed
at its
far end, a light monsoon rain began to fall. Within
minutes the
crew fired up the transmitter and laptop,
and cables snaked across the wet
grass.
The transmitter is a vintage 50-watt FM exciter, a
clunky beast that goes
back to the early days of the
KCR and is too big to fit anywhere except on
the
rooftop rack. (This is an obvious worry for the
Kothmale station,
particularly during the monsoon, and
they are raising the funds to buy a
sleeker model that
will fit inside the eTukTuk). I watched bemused as
an
18-foot antenna mast was put together swiftly from
three lengths of
galvanised iron pipe clamped
end-to-end.
Sunil Shanta, the KCR's relief announcer, launched
into a practised spiel
that was fed into the twin
speakers mounted on the eTukTuk's roof. Soon,
the
clearing and the shed filled with an expectant crowd -
mostly women
and children - some carrying plastic
chairs and mats.
Weliganga is a Dalit village, a hamlet of drum makers
and subsistence
farmers, generally shunned by their
better off neighbours. Sunil Wijesinghe
said that only
a few days earlier, a local monk had stormed into
his
office, outraged by the contents of a recent
programme. Apparently,
the radio station had aired the
comments of Weliganga's villagers, who said
they were
not allowed entry into the local temple. Even their
children,
said the villagers, had to travel long
distances to study as they were
discriminated against
in the local school.
With monsoon clouds rolling overhead and the shed's
roof leaking like a
sieve, the show got under way.
Achala, a class IX student, launched into a
Sinhala
prayer song. Livelier numbers followed, and soon the
shed was
filled with singing, clapping and dancing
youngsters, with three drummers
maintaining a steady
beat.
Ben Grubb dashed into the eTukTuk to check on the
equipment, but Buddhika
Sampath, the KCR's content
creation specialist, shooed him away and took over
the
audio recording. Inside the shed, Sunil Shanta, the
programme
presenter, worked the crowd and kept up a
steady banter.
The rain had died down to a sporadic drizzle. It was
half past six and too
dark to see, but the unlit shed
was still alive with song, drumbeats and
girlish
laughter. Reluctantly, Sunil wound up the proceedings
and the
eTukTuk splashed its way back to the station
on the muddy hill roads, driven
by Nishanta, the
strapping volunteer driver.
That night at Sunil Wijesinghe's house, it is time for
a reality check.
Earlier that week in Colombo, I had
heard frequent criticism that the
Kothmale community
radio experiment had outlived its usefulness.
There
were constant jibes, not least of all from former
Kothmale staff,
that the `community radio' station had
very little community involvement,
since it was
effectively owned and run by the Sri Lanka
Broadcasting
Corporation.
Community support: SAJAN VENNIYOOR
Achala, a Class IX student, begins the
radio broadcast
in Weliganga with a Sinhala prayer song.
It is true that KCR's success is offset by the
comparative failure of
other community radio stations
that were set up in the region at the same
time. But,
as Sunil pointed out, it was precisely the support of
the
community that set Kothmale apart, and accounted
for its success. "This
evening at Weliganga," he
asked, "did you feel that the community was
not
involved?"
Nevertheless, Kothmale is an exception. Sri Lanka is
not the only country
in South Asia without a proper
community radio policy. In Colombo, I had
bumped into
A.H.M. Bazlur Rahman of BNNRC (Bangladesh NGOs Network
for
Radio & Communication) at an international ICT
conference. Bazlur and I
performed a familiar ritual.
"What's the latest on your CR policy?" I asked.
Bazlur
Rahman shrugged eloquently: "Many promises, no
policy." "Same in
India," I said, as we pondered the
mysteries of broadcast regulation in the
subcontinent.
India's community radio policy has been in the
pipeline for so long
that it seems to have congealed.
A draft policy was sent for Cabinet approval
on
October 6, 2005, and then referred to a Group of
Ministers. Seven
months on, the GoM has yet to meet
and decide on the new policy, which
promises to open
up the airwaves to community groups.
In Kothmale, Sunil was a worried man. Ben's finances
are somewhat
precarious and he will need to return to
Australia to replenish his bank
balance. "Please tell
him to stay," Sunil urged agitatedly. Ben does
not
want to leave Kothmale either, but he has little
choice. Buddhika,
Sunil Shanta and Nishanta were in
animated conversation, and occasionally
sought my
opinion on broadcasting by tuktuk. I tried to find
parallels
between the massive OB vans of All India
Radio - lumbering juggernauts of
broadcast technology
- and the nimble little tuktuk, but soon give up.
Clearly, the eTukTuk is one of a kind. One can only
hope - as Steve
Buckley prophesies - that the trend
will catch on and that swarms of eTukTuks
will boldly
go where no broadcaster has gone before.
Sajan Venniyoor is a long-time radio broadcaster and
activist for
community radio.
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Source: Frontline &
http://www.hard-core-dx.com/redirect.php?http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/135958/1/1893
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Jaisakthivel,
Chennai