Radio Broadcasting in Colonial India

This chapter discusses the preparations for World War II in relation to advances in radio broadcasting to the Indian public. Responsibility for radio broadcasting in British India became part of the portfolio of the Labour Bureau and thus one of the state’s apparatus surrounding the maintenance of colonial power. The arrangement in India was different from that of radio broadcasting in the UK during the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s where the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) had been created under Royal Charter with editorial independence from government and commercial interests. In contrast, the British Government of India, and several of Britain’s other colonial territories set up public communications departments that were attached to central government bureaus primarily because the notion of public service broadcasting sat awkwardly against colonial power structures.

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