Television in South Asia: Cultural Scenario And Future Directions

Major debates center around cultural and media imperialism to determine whether South Asian cultural traditions are being engulfed by Euro-American transnational television. This study provides a South Asian perspective on issues relating to television broadcasting, program planning, and communication research and suggests that television has undergone an indigenous process of change. Globalization and economic liberalization have brought hundreds of private transnational satellite television channels including Hinglish and English to South Asia. The governments are taking a regulatory, rather than a controlling, role in framing media policy to promote a plural culture and equal opportunities for its visual expression. Television production so far has assumed a coherent South Asian civilization and consequently, emphasis has been placed on promoting cultural uniformity.

Dr. Binod C. Agrawal is the Director of the TALEEM Research Foundation, Ahmedabad. He has been deeply involved in communication research for over two decades and pioneered the use of qualitative methods for communications research during the world famous Satellite Instructional Television Experiment. Dr. Agrawal is founder and Director of the Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad. He has taught in the United States and India and continues to serve as visiting faculty for several institutions. His publications include more than a dozen books and thirty papers on television, computer technology, and anthropological studies.