Listening to the Radio

This blog post was written on an earlier blog – http://lifeofpradeep.wordpress.com. I recovered the post using the Wayback Machine

I filled my empty days in high school by listening to the growing crop of radio stations on a Sony Walkman which could otherwise play a tape cassette. I didn’t have money to buy too many cassettes and didn’t like playing the ones that I had more than twice or thrice a week. This meant listening to the radio. The private players were not mature in the field yet and their programming was not of any good quality. This pushed me to the only good radio station I could recieve in Mumbai, 107.1 FM All India Radio. Now, called AIR FM Rainbow.

A long time has passed since then. The programming on the radio stations has changed significantly since that time. On all stations. Private radio stations have significantly improved on using their platforms for tackling local social issues, connecting commercial vendors with sales opportunities and is increasingly moving in to the areas of personal advice. The All India Radio stations though are moving into areas of news and current affairs, covering areas rarely covered by other services, primarily because they are prohibited from doing so.

I like to listen to music during my morning walks. Even with 50-60 songs on my phone’s MP3 player, I get as tired of listening to these as during my tape cassette days. I started listening to the radio again. The early morning programme Subah Savere on AIR FM Gold channel is what I listen to. A programme in English and Hindi is a variety talk programme that covers among other things, news, literary subjects, this day in history etc. I have not expanded my radio listening to other time slots, yet. Though, I think it will be useful exercise for my ears to listen to and retain what has been said. I will report here on further developments, if any.

In the meanwhile, I also want to devote some time in trying to re-engage with my high school desire to get a ham radiolicense.