The Hindu : Kerala / Kozhikode News : AIR Kozhikode completes 55 years

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, May 15, 2005

Kerala

Kerala - Kozhikode

AIR Kozhikode completes 55 years

Staff Reporter

KOZHIKODE: All India Radio (AIR), Kozhikode completed 55 years of broadcasting on Saturday. It was on May 14, 1950 that the AIR Kozhikode station started broadcasting its programmes.

The first broadcast programme was `Veerakeralam' a music programme which came from the creative pen of P. Bhaskaran, lyricist-director, who also was one of the first staffers of the Kozhikode station. This was followed by a talk by poet, Vallathol Narayana Menon.

A poetry session comprising N. V. Krishna Varier, Vailoppilli Sreedhara Menon and Vennikulam Gopala Kurup was the next programme. Music lovers got another feast with the concert of Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavathar being broadcast on that day.

The Kozhikode AIR station was set up to encourage folk music of Malabar. A regional station of the AIR, the Kozhikode station was perhaps the first regional AIR station in the country to broadcast in `mahl' a language of the people of Minicoy island in Lakshadweep.

Currently, there are only three regional AIR stations in the State including Thiruvananthapuram and Thrissur.

Kozhikode and Thiruvananthapuram have `Vividh Bharathi' stations which are Frequency Modulation (FM) stations.

The broadcast for Lakshadweep was first started in 1962 as a weekly broadcast. Then it was converted into daily broadcast in 1969.

The news was broadcast from the Kozhikode station from April 4, 1966.

A few of the noted announcers who had worked at the Station include Maya Narayanan, Khan Kavil and V.Narayanan.

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