Antarvani wins National Award for Sustainability Model in the Country
KALABURAGI: The Radio Antarvani, a Community Radio Station (CRS) run by the Sharnbasaveshwar Vidya Vardak Sangha in Kalaburagi City has won the National award by standing third in the National competitions organized by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting for all the 500 plus CRS in the country for the year 2024.
According to the communiqué received by the Sharnabasaveshwar Vidya Vardak Sangha from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, the Radio Antarvani has bagged the third prize in the “Sustainability Model Awards” category which carries a cash prize of Rs 50,000, a certificate of commendation and a shield.
The visually impaired Director of the Radio Antarvani, Dr Shivaraj Shastri Herur who has been conferred with D.Litt award by the Sharnbasva University, said that the Radio Antarvani overcame a tough competition among 500 Plus CRS and won the award. Incidentally, Radio Antarvani is the only CRS in the entire Karnataka to get this recognition from the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
Dr Shastri said that the major criteria which clicked in favour of Radio Antarvani to win the National recognition were the content creation, Programme Banking, Community participation in the the programmes produced and broadcast by the Radio Antarvani, Sound Financial Sustainability and Technical support it enjoyed.
He said live phone in programmes conducted every day by the Antarvani ensured community participation in the programmes conducted by the Antarvani and in the 50 per cent of the content created by the Antarvani was done in the studio and rest of the 50 per cent content is recorded outdoor ensuring the community participation in the programmes generated by it as required by the criteria for getting the national recognition.
He said that Antarvani was in the air for 10 hours every day with a record 36,000 hours programme in the system storage of the Antarvani. Another favourable point gained by the Antarvani in the contest was the self sustainability in the finances to operate the Radio Antarvani without the continued support of the government. The Sangha had demosited a sum of Rs 50 lakhs as Fixed Deposit in a nationalized bank in the name of Antarvani and the interest accrued is used to meet the salary expenditure of the two employees working in the radio station and meeting other expenditure including the payment of Internet rent and other expenditures.
Dr Shastri said that the Radio Antarvani also generated its own funds from the advertisements released by the Union Government through DAVP, UNICEF and local advertisements to meet other emergency requirements. The Sangha had also generous in providing the funds for refurbishing the studio and providing three fully air conditioned aquastic rooms used for recording, broadcasting and transmission of the programmes of Antarvani.
He said Antarvani covers a radius of 30 KM providing the access of the programmes broadcast by the station to the listers in more than 100 villages. The programmes broadcast by the Antarvani Radio centres around, Culture, Folk, Environment issues, Literature and social issues. The popular programmes of the Antarvani included Arogya Vani, Live in Programmes and Sharanabasaveshwar Suprabhata. Apart from this Radio Antarvani Application is available for the listeners worldwide on 24X7 basis.
The 8th Mahadasoha Peetadhipathi of the Sharnbasaveshwar Samasthan Poojya Dr Sharnbaswappa Appaji, Chairperson of the Sharanabasaveshwar Vidya Vardak Sangha Matoshree Dr Dakshayini Avvaji, Secretary of the Sangha Mr Basavaraj Deshmukh congratulated Dr Shastri for the achievement.