Sangham Radio
Sangham, referring to village level women’s collectives, is the cornerstone of Deccan Development Society’s work. Sangham radio, started more than ten years ago, is intended to give a voice to the excluded in general and to women in particular. This is a radio owned, managed and operated by women from the margins of the Society, people who have been mostly excluded in public forums. Sangham Radio focuses on issues such as Food Sovereignty, Seed Sovereignty, Autonomous Health, Autonomous Market, and Autonomous Media. It also addresses issues like retrieving the culture, language and local traditions in food and farming, health and ecology. The radio broadcasts to a radius of 25 kms covering about 100 villages and a population close to 50,000.
What we deliver
Primary audience is rural women from the marginalized groups, also targets rural people in general. The Themes include Seed sovereignty and women; Food sovereignty and women; Women and biodiversity; Women and land; Ownership; Women and ecological agriculture; Ecological enterprises for rural women; Healthcare and plant medicines; Herbal care for animal diseases; Making children’s education relevant to rural milieu; violence against women; legal education for women. The Sangham radio is broadcasting daily from 7 pm to 9 pm to a radius of 25 km covering about 100 villages and a population close to 50,000. From October 15, 2008 till now it is broadcasted 568 hours of recordings on different topics. As many as 2,500 women are involved in contributing to the programmes apart from 16 ‘reporters’ who go out to the villages and record them
How is the project unique?
Community radio itself is a new empowering tool. When this tool is used by women, for issues specifically related to them, the process and the subsequent results have a tremendous impact on the target community. All work of Deccan Development Society is focused on ensuring women’s control over their own lives and issues. The Sangham Community Radio is a pioneer in its sphere as it was one of the first initiatives which started the community radio movement in India. Sangham, meaning “collective”, reflects the true spirit of community radio
Roadmap
We think an autonomous media that can be controlled by the local communities, particularly the women. This thinking has produced a Community Media Trust set up by the DDS, but completely autonomously owned and operated by the women of the area. Ten trustees operate the Trust, all of who are local women belonging to dalit castes. The Community Media Trust has two wings: * Video Production Centre * Community Radio Station. The Video Production Centre is operated by about eight women half of who are non literate. They are not only engaged in their own video productions but also train other women in their own area as well as farmers in the South Asia region. The Video production unit regularly produces programmes that further the ideologies of the women of DDS sanghams. They also contribute occasionally to the mainstream television channels in the area both for newscasts as well as standalone programmes.
Contact
Deccan Development Society
General Narsamma
Machnoor Village, Zaheerabad Mandal, Medak District, Andhra Pradesh; Liason Office: # 101, Kishan Residency, Street No 5, Begumpet, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh 500 016
URL/Website – http://www.ddsindia.com/
