February 13 - World Radio Day

My earliest memory of radio is my father listening to news bulletin by leaning over a wooden stand on which a big radio set was positioned.  It was a radio set made by Telerad (looked almost like the picture that I have shared below).  When the radio was switched on, a green light used to appear indicating the signal quality.  It used to take a while for the radio to catch the signals and start playing.  Radio was the only means of entertainment those days.  We depended on it for listening to music, cultural programmes, drama, news, commentary of sports events and much more. There were small tea shops in my area where radio used to be played continuously.  People used to gather in the morning to sip hot tea and listen to news in the radio.  All India Radio stations used to start their broadcast in the morning with a signature tune, which echoes in my mind even today.

Another fond memory associated with radio is that my uncle was a radio mechanic.  He had a shop at Kollam, my mother’s place.  Whenever I visited them, I used to go to his shop and observe him repair radio sets with amusement.  Those were the days of valve radios.  Most of them used to be big in size, with a wooden cover and reasonably heavy.  

Once when I was helping my father clean his cupboard, I saw a small blue color book, on which ‘Radio License’ was written.  My father told me that people had to pay license to own a radio set in India and the same had to be renewed annually at the nearest post office.  That system was abolished in early 80s.  I am sure the current generation can hardly believe that one had to get a license to listen to radio!

Apart from the local radio stations, we used to regularly listen to Radio Ceylon.  Based in Sri Lanka, Radio Ceylon is the first radio station in Asia.  They used to broadcast programmes in Sinhalese, Hindi, Tamil, and Malayalam.  Gradually we migrated from big radio sets to small transistor radios and portable pocket radios.  

Radio became an integral part of my life when I moved to Ahmedabad.  I was sharing an apartment with three of my friends and we didn’t have TV.  So, after the dinner we used to head straight to the terrace with a transistor radio.  All India Radio’s Vividh Bharti was our favorite station.  Geetmala, the legendary host Ameen Sayani’s programme of Hindi film songs was very popular those days. 

FM radio almost revolutionized our radio experience.  Today we get radio in our phone, vehicles and even in the television.  Probably there is no other medium which is so popular, affordable, and accessible to millions across the world.  Radio must have gone through lot of changes in its broadcasting technology, but it remained and will remain an integral part of our lives.  In 2011, UNESCO declared February 13^th as the ‘World Radio Day’.  This year’s theme for the World Radio Day is ‘Radio and Trust’.  

You can read more about the World Radio Day here: 

https://en.unesco.org/commemorations/worldradioday

You can listen to the AIR's signature tune here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuS-UiaKiVk