Media in Goa

Goa is India's smallest state (3700 square kilometres, 1.4 million population) and former Portuguese colony. Its media is a complex reality to understand and comprehend, and has often been commented on.

Background

Over the years, the media has changed vastly from (in its early 20th century days) being a battlefield for influential lobbies within the local Catholic society (including caste-based elites, or politically divided groups) which were largely controlled by influential and educated local elites. After the end of Portuguese rule in 1961, a number of new newspapers were set up, which were closely aligned to the influential local mining lobby. This too has changed in recent years, with some sections of the media being more closely politically aligned.

Languages

Widest read papers in Goa tend to be published currently in the English and Marathi languages, with the widely-spoken local language of Konkani presently have just a single daily newspaper, called Sunaparant. It also needs to be noted that Konkani-versus-Marathi linguistic battles have led to some rivalry between these two language camps. (As of 2006, there is also some friction between the users of the official Devanagiri script and the Roman, or Romi, script users of Konkani.)

English-language papers in Goa comprise the Navhind Times, published by the mining house of the Dempos since 1963 and currently (as of February 2006) edited by Arun Sinha, the former Portuguese-language daily now an English-language broadsheet called Herald or, more formally going by the name it is registered under, O Heraldo. This paper is owned by Fernandes Publications, a local group involved in printing enterprises that grew out of an earlier stationery shop. The third English-language daily publication is Gomantak Times, which changed hands recently from its earlier owners from the mining house of the Chowgules to the politically linked Pawar family, based in the neighbouring state of Maharashtra.

In February 2006, the editors of the Herald and Gomantak Times were Robin Abreu, a journalist earlier based in Mumbai and Sujay Gupta, who worked for The Telegraph of Kolkata and other newspapers.

The lone English-monthly is the Goa Today, edited by Vinayak Naik and owned by the Goa Publications, a firm controlled by the Salgaocars mining house. Other publications in the English-language include the Goa Messenger, Goan Observer, etc.

In the field of Marathi, some of the popular newspapers are the Tarun Bharat (which was earlier published from the neighbouring city of Belgaum but now has its presses in Porvorim); Also important newspaper is [Daily Pudhari].(which was earlier published from the Karaswada Mapusa.) the Gomantak (a sister publication of the Gomantak Times, and much more influential in the past); Navprabha of the Navhind Times/Dempos group, and other publications which mostly come out with "Goa editions" published through presses and offices run from outside Goa.

One recent development was the launch of the Gova Doot.Another nearly three-decade old newspaper, the Marathi daily Rashtramath from the South Goa city of Margao suspended publications at the early part of this decade.

In the 1980s, a Roman-script Konkani paper called Novem Goem folded up in large part due to financial difficulties and alleged mismanagement, in spite of being set up with much enthusiasm and even a drive to collect funds for it through a 'padyatra' (foot-march) across Goa.

Radio

Goa was once home to the Emisora Goa, a powerful radio station that was widely listened to when this small region was still a Portuguese colony. After the end of Portuguese rule, this station was replaced by a station from the All India Radio network.

Its studios are at Altinho, the hillock atop state-capital Panjim – also known as Panaji, Pangim or Ponnje – and its transmitters are located at Bambolim, some 5 km away. Bambolim also houses some powerful transmitters that broadcast foreign-language programmes as part of India's international programme. Two AM channels are broadcast, the primary channel at 1287kHz and the Vividh Bharati channel at 1539kHz.

Besides the AM broadcasts, All India Radio also has an FM, or frequency modulated channel. It is called Rainbow FM and is broadcast at 105.4MHz. Since 2006, the FM broadcast is from 4.30 am to 12 midnight. The locally produced programs include mainly English, Konkani and Hindi music. The channel relays programs from AIR FM Rainbow India channel during the time slots when it does not broadcast its own programs. This channel has the best variety for listeners.

St Xavier's College in Mapusa started its campus community radio, named Voice of Xavier’s (VOX) on 17 December 2006 at 90.4 MHz. The station has a power output of 20 watts. This was Goa's second FM station.

In the end of January 2006, three private FM radio players - linked to the Indian media giant Times of India, the BPL electronics hardware firm, and the mega corporation Anil Ambani-linked Adlabs - won bids to set up private FM radio stations in Goa. Big FM at 92.7 MHz and Radio Mirchi at 98.3 MHz launched in Goa in May 2007. Radio Indigo at 91.9 MHz, the country's first and only 24hr international hit music station launched in June 2007. Big FM plays only Hindi music while Radio Mirchi features mainly Hindi music with a few Konkani songs. This has disappointed listeners, who were expecting a lot of English and Konkani music as the channels had claimed before launching. However, these channels' programs are hosted in both English and Konkani and the Konkani hosting has struck a chord with listeners. These channels have roped in popular Goan artists, tiatrist Prince Jacob and musician-singer Remo Fernandes. Radio Indigo programming is contemporary international music and international hit music. The music and hosting is purely in English, Due to this, listeners feel a Goan flavour is missing in the programming. All three radio stations broadcast 24 hours a day.

Though the new FM stations have bought life to Radio industry in Goa, the signal strength and the coverage of the same remains very weak (almost nil ) in southern part of Goa, that is after Verna plateau, thus most of the people of south Goa are unable to get reception in their home.

There is also an educational channel, Gyan Vani, run by IGNOU broadcast from Panaji at 107.8 MHz.

Broadcasting background

In the mid-nineties, when India first experimented private FM broadcasts, the small tourist destination of Goa was the fifth place in this country of one billion where private players got FM slots. The other four centres were the big metro cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai.

In Phase-II of FM licensing, Goa (rather, its state capital of Panaji) was categorised as a 'D'-class city, i.e. having a population between 100,000 to 300,000.

In Goa, India's smallest state with a population of just 1.4 million, the successful bidders were ENIL (Times group – Radio Mirchi) Rs 17.1 million; Indigo (Jupiter Capital – Rajiv Chandrasekhar) Rs 12.9 million; and Adlabs (Reliance – Anil Ambani group) Rs 12.1 million.

Indian policy currently lays down that these bids are a One-Time Entry Fee (OTEF), for the entire license period of 10 years.

(Under the Indian accounting system, this amount is amortised for the 10 year period at 10% per year. In other words, in the company's profit-and-loss account, ENIL will calculate their Rs 17.1 million as Rs 1.71 million per year.)

The Reserve Price is calculated as 25% of the highest valid bid. In this case, the reserve price in the Goan capital is Rs 4.27 million.

Annual license fee for private players is either 4% of revenue share or 10% of Reserve Price, whichever is higher. Therefore, the minimum guaranteed annual payment for Panaji FM operators would be 10% of Rs 4.27 million, or Rs 427,000 only (unless their revenue is much higher).

Earlier, India's attempts to privatise its FM channels ran into rough weather, when private players bid heavily and most could not meet their commitments to pay the governments the amounts they had expected.

In FM Phase-1 (year 2000), the highest bid in Goa was Rs 41.5 million. Under the policy then, this would have escalated – at 15% each year – to Rs. 146 million by the tenth year of operation. The bidder would have ended up paying Rs. 42.6 crores over 10 years! Some see it as not surprising that the major players then backed off.

This time round, the only local company from Goa to bid for a license this time was Tarun Bharat Multigraphics. All the winning players are based outside Goa; it is to be seen what effect this will have on the way their channels are run.

All the three winning bidders this time will have to co-site their transmitting infrastructure with All India Radio's tower on the outskirts of Panaji, unless the policy is changed.

AIR’s FM Rainbow has a six kW transmitter, and even this is not heard properly in some distant areas of Goa. The private FM operators are allowed only 3 kW transmitters.

Radio Mirchi (of what was the Times FM group, run by one of the biggest newspaper chains in the country) is making a come-back to Goa after many years. In the late 1980s and early 90s, Times FM used to buy air-time on AIR’s Panaji FM channel.

The three new 24 hour stereo channels are expected to go on air by the end of 2006. Times could be first off the mark, but the others also have deep pockets.

C and D category cities are allowed to network and share programming, but generally, channels prefer to do in-house programming.

News in not permitted on private FM (though the federal minister says this may be reconsidered in two or three years). Nationally, many of the current FM players – like the Times of India, Hindustan Times, Mid-Day, BBC etc – are essentially newspaper chains or media, and they are already making a strong pitch for News on FM.

Broadcast initiatives

As of now (February 2006), Goa does not have any independent television stations, apart from the state-funded Doordarshan broadcasting network, which puts out programmes in local languages (Konkani, Marathi) for a small duration.

But there are TV-news operations, which cover local events including political developments and reach viewers through the local cable network. Such operations include the In Goa News Goa Newsline, Goa Plus, Goa365, among others. The earlier BJP government had officially acknowledged that it was subsidising the operations of some networks, and argued that this was needed to promote programming in the local language.

Newspapers and magazines

Local newspaper publications include the English language Herald (it is Goa's oldest surviving newspaper and was, until 1983, a Portuguese paper known as oHeraldo but shifted over to the English language then), the lively but smaller Gomantak Times and the first English-language daily to be published from Goa Navhind Times. In addition to these, The Times of India and the Indian Express are also received from Bombay and Bangalore in the urban areas. Since June 2008, the Goa Edition of the Times of India started publication, and is strong competition to the other English dailies such as The Navhind Times, Gomantak Times and The Herald.

Among the list of officially-accredited newspapers are The Navhind Times, The Herald Times and The Gomantak Times (all in the English language) and Gomantak, Tarun Bharat, Navprabha, Pudhari, Goa Times, Sanatan Prabhat, Govadoot (all in Marathi), besides Sunaparant in Devanagiri-script Konkani. All are dailies. Gomantak was once the leading daily of Goa, before being overtaken by Tarun Bharat .

Out-station dailies, reaching Goa from other centres of publication, include Kesari, Times Of India, Maharashtra Times, Loksatta, The Asian Age, Deccan Herald, The Hindu, The Hindustan Times, Navashakti, etc. Among the two mainstream news agencies operating in the state are the Press Trust of India and the United News of India.

In 2011 Aug the first live internet news webcast commenced by IN GOA NEWS and http://www.goanews24x7

Other publications in the state include Hello Publications Hello Travel Talk[1] (English-language,A Tourism Magazine),Whats On Goa[2] (English-language, Fortnightly-An Event Lister Of Goa),Hello City - Hello Panjim , Hello Margao (English-language),Hello Goa Yellowpages[3] (English-language,Yearly) Goa Today (English-language, monthly), Goan Observer (English, weekly), Vavraddeancho Ixtt (Roman-script Konkani, weekly) Goa Messenger, Gulab (Konkani, monthly), Bimb (Devanagiri-script Konkani), Poddbimb(konkani roman monthly)Harbour Times, [Digital Goa], and "J's House".

Latest newspaper & Internet media

The latest weekly newspaper to hit the stands in Goa is 'Panjim Bulletin' edited by Lucy Saldanah. It is a combination of 24 colour and black pages with mostly light reading stuffs. The paper can be accessed at www.panjimbulletin.co.in.

www.classifiedsgoa.com - stated in feb 2007 - Online classifieds goa. Most popular, member - generated online classifieds and advertisement network integrating community media and local commerce services

Television

Goa is served by almost all the television channels available in India. Channels are received through cable in most parts of Goa. In the interior regions, channels are received via satellite dishes.

Doordarshan (DD), the national television broadcaster, has two free terrestrial channels on air. Goa has all the cable TV channels generally found in India, namely: MTV, ESPN, Fox, Zee TV, ZEE Marathi, HBO, Star Plus, Star Movies, BBC, CNN, Tensports, AXN, Star World, Star News, Fashion TV, Sony, Set Max, SAB, Sahara One, Sahara News, Discovery Channel, National Geographic, Animal Planet, Channel X5 etc. Electronic media with DTH (Direct To Home) TV services are available from Dish TV, Tata Sky & DD Direct Plus.

Telecom

Major cellular service operators include Reliance Infocomm, Tata Indicom, BSNL, Vodafone(Previously Hutch), Bharti Airtel and Idea cellular.

Critiques of the media

Writing in the early 1980s,, anthropologist Dr Robert S Newman spoke about the relationship with the media in Goa with the "big families" – mainly comprising "a handful of small-businessmen, traditional landowners, and war profiteers (who) received iron ore mining licenses, and were encouraged to dig and ship the ore to Japan (which needed it for reconstruction after World War II)."

Newman wrote, in an essay titled Goa - The Transformation of an Indian Region, published in Pacific Affairs (August 1984) wrote: "[Goa's first post-colonial chief minister Dayanand] Bandodkar and his fellow industrialists attempted to shape public opinion through their newspapers – there are almost no independent papers in Goa – and through tertiary educational institutions which they themselves had established. The Chowgules, for example, launched the newspapers Gomantak and Uzvadd, and were founders of an arts and science college at Margao; the Salgaocars founded a law college; and the Dempos own The Navhind Times and Navprabha, and are involved in Dhempe College at Miramar."

Another essay titled Popular Protest and the Free Goa Press (pp 91–113) in Norman Dantas' The Transformation of Goa (The Other India Press, Mapusa, 1999) argues: "In Goa, the daily newspapers' editorial stances on various protest movements would tend to reveal a largely unfriendly attitude towards such actions. It is not perhaps coincidental that individuals and groups involved in protest issues in Goa have often felt that they have received an unfair deal from the media." It looks at protest and the media response to it in Goa over a three decade period, from the early 'sixties to the 'nineties.

External links