COMMUNITY RADIO IN NEPAL: A CASE STUDY OF COMMUNITY RADIO MADANPOKHARA A dissertation presented to the faculty of the Scripps College of Communication of Ohio University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy Arjun Banjade August 2007 This dissertation titled COMMUNITY RADIO IN NEPAL: A CASE STUDY OF COMMUNITY RADIO MADANPOKHARA by ARJUN BANJADE has been approved for the School of Telecommunications and the Scripps College of Communication by _______________________________ Drew O. McDaniel Professor of Telecommunications ________________________________ Gregory J. Shepherd Dean, Scripps College of Communication Abstract BANJADE, ARJUN, Ph.D., August 2007, Mass Communication COMMUNITY RADIO IN NEPAL: A CASE STUDY OF COMMUNITY RADIO MADANPOKHARA (353 pp.) Director of Dissertation: Drew O. McDaniel This study is about Community Radio Madanpokhara (CRM) in Palpa district in Western Nepal. Initiated and managed by the local residents, CRM has been on the air on frequency modulation (FM) band serving 800,000 potential listeners in the region since 2000. Triangulating in-depth interviews, observations and an audience survey as methods, this research explores the nature and extent of the local residents’ participation in the communication process. The station, operating with a wide participation from its community members, has not only been successful in providing them with an access to much needed information and entertainment but has also, in fact, proved to be an important avenue for the local population to express their opinions and views as well as exchange feelings. An audience survey, conducted in January 2004, revealed that 80.8 percentage of the local respondents listen to their community radio station for information and entertainment. Community radio in the region not only took away listeners from the state owned radio station, it also added new listeners. Thus, operation of a community radio station is not about sharing power, but it is also about creating new power. CRM has increased access to information for a larger section of rural population previously not served or underserved by the state media or the capital based-elite media. If knowledge is power and democracy is more about decentralization of power, then community radio stations in Nepal are truly championing this cause by creating many centers of power in the nation by empowering those left behind in the process and by securing their active involvement. They are encouraging the dispossessed and the marginalized in breaking the ages-old culture of silence, and CRM is leading the way in this endeavor. Approved: _____________________________________________________________ Drew O. McDaniel Professor of Telecommunications Dedication To my parents Yog Prasad & Rukmini Banjade, my wife Anju & my daughter Anusuya Banjade, my parents-in-law Jibnath & Kamala Kharel, and those who contributed in the establishment and the development of community media in Nepal Acknowledgments I would like to express my deep gratitude to Professor Dr. Drew O. McDaniel for his continued support and guidance throughout the research process. Professor McDaniel not only served as my academic and dissertation advisor, but also helped me whenever I needed him at Ohio University. I would like to express my gratitude to the dissertation committee members Professor Dr. Don Flournoy, Professor Dr. Arvind Singhal and Professor Dr. Sung-Ho Kim for their feedback and insight during the research. I would also like to thank all my professors and colleagues who contributed to my academic skills and knowledge. I am grateful to the staff and volunteers of Community Radio Madanpokhara (CRM) for their active participation in the research process. Special thanks go to Gunakar Aryal, Station Manager; Somnath Aryal, Station Coordinator; Rajesh Aryal, Program Coordinator; Ramesh Aryal, Office Assistant; and Yam Prasad Pandey, President of the Executive Committee of CRM. I would like to thank Radio Representatives of CRM who worked very hard with a minimum reimbursement for the audience survey as well as those residents who participated in the survey. I would also like to thank the Local Initiative Support Program of Helvetas for financial assistance to CRM for the audience survey. Finally, yet importantly, I am grateful to my wife Anju Banjade for her support and my daughter Anusuya Banjade for not giving a hard time during those difficult days. Preface My idea of writing about community radio in Nepal has its root in my first meeting with my academic advisor Professor Drew McDaniel. I met Drew in the Front Room at the Baker Center in fall 2000 and discussed possible research areas at this coffee meeting. I still remember the questions he asked me; it was something like this: “What do you want to do after your studies? Do you want to go back to Nepal or stay in the U.S.?” Honestly, I was not sure at that moment what I wanted to do. Drew advised me to choose a research topic that interested me. His questions and suggestions always remained in my mind whenever I thought about my research project. Community radio in Nepal was not the only topic but one of the topics at that moment. My interaction with Professor Arvind Singhal reinforced the idea of choosing community radio in Nepal. Returning from Miami after participating at the 19th Intercultural Communication Conference held at the University of Miami on April 2002, we were in the same flight and I received a ride from Arvind Singhal from Columbus to Athens, Ohio. On the way, Arvind made three points when choosing a research topic for my dissertation: remember your origin, topic that interests you, and area that you can contribute in your field. Community radio is a new concept in Nepal as well as in the whole of South Asia. In 1997, Nepal became the first country in South Asia that granted a license to the non- government sector to operate a community radio station. Community Radio Madanpokhara (CRM) in Palpa district in Western Nepal became the first such station to be operated in a rural setting. Coming from a remote village in Western Nepal, I found community radio stations that aim to empower the marginalized sector of the society an interesting area to explore. I come from Arghakhanchi, a neighboring district in the west of Palpa district. On the way to Kathmandu or back home, I had seen the beautiful village of Madanpokhara from a distance. In my first visit to the station in 2002, I found CRM staff very cooperative. I returned to CRM in December 2003 and spent on and off about seven months. In my first meeting, the management at CRM showed an interest in an audience survey that was not in my proposed research plan and I did not have budget to do. CRM found a sponsor to cover the expenses and the audience survey was carried out. Not only was the audience survey added on the request from the station, I also opened an Internet website for the station and put a couple of pages online. The radio staff were comfortable sharing all kinds of information; some were so personal I have not reported it in my dissertation. I was an outsider, studying the station, and was quickly becoming a part of the station. I knew Madanpokhara as one of the model villages in Nepal dominated by communists. As a member of a democratic party, I did not expect a high level of cooperation from the station management composed of active communist leaders in the region. To my surprise, no one in the management team as well as the programming staff asked me about my political affiliation. I still do not know whether they already knew and decided not to ask or they did not care about my political affiliation. Everyone affiliated with the station provided whatever information and assistance was asked for. As discussed later in the methodology chapter, this study uses both quantitative method such as an audience survey as well as qualitative research methods such as participant observation and in-depth interviews. In the participant observations and in- depth interviews, I was personally involved and often times my experiences have been reflected in my writing. However, in case of the audience survey, I was neither a participant nor an observer. Rather, I was an outsider collecting objective knowledge about the audiences of Community Radio Madanpokhara. In such cases, I have used third person instead of reflecting my personal experiences. I have divided this dissertation into seven chapters. Chapter 1 provides an introduction and the background to the study. Chapter 2 aims to provide the theoretical foundation for the study. Chapter 3 deals with the development of radio broadcasting in Nepal. Most of the dates were converted from the Nepali calendar into the Western system and might have minor discrepancies. A chronology of major political and media developments has been attached as an appendix. Chapter 4 explains the methodologies used for the study. Similarly, Chapter 5, based on interviews and observations, deals with CRM. Chapter 6 is about the audience survey. Chapter 7 consists of discussion, summaries and conclusion. At the end, I provide appendices and references. 10 Table of Contents Page ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................................................3 DEDICATION...............................................................................................................................................5 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.............................................................................................................................6