Radio

In this era of Computers and Internet it might seem odd to talk about the radio, but I couldn’t resist my self from writing about an old rectangular black box which stood proudly on the wooden stand of our drawing room unaware of it’s age and title “The Endangered Species”. This old little piece was an integral part of my life for over seventeen years.

As far as I remember, I always woke up by the sweet devotional songs or by the dull prabhashnams (devotional speeches) or the boring slokams from the program “Subhashitangal” which the All India Radio Thrissur Station played at six in the morning. At times I really hated those religious Gurus (of all religions – as AIR tried to retain communal harmony) simply because they woke me from my dreams. As I grew up this program did have an influence on me as it helped me understand and respect all religions. I had no options to switch off the radio as our family’s timetable was stuck with it. For instance I would study till I hear “kavyanjali “at seven; it was time for me to take bath. This I loved to drag to seven fifteen as it was my favorite program. Famous and favorite lines of Malayalam poems would be recited by known and unknown Poets. I still cherish the poem which narrates the story of a young shanti who gets scolded by his mother when she sees a long black hair in the naivedyam (Prasad from temple). When the English news starts at eight I know it’s time for my school bus. This way we were all tuned to radio time. The morning course of programs would get over at nine fifteen by that time my mother would be ready to leave for her office (the last one to leave).
This poor old radio not only scheduled my time, but also it helped me with my lessons. When I was in Xth I used to listen to lectures of great teachers on how to prepare for exams, which all portions where important from the exam point of view and stuffs like that. On Sunday noon when Doordharshan showed dragging award films of different languages we would listen to music or Shabdharega.Though this poor radio delivered all these; we never touched it during night as we were busy with TV. With the intervention of cable connection providing hundreds of channel we never bothered to switch on the radio.
When I went to collage I have looked with admiration at the long antenna that every civil engineering batch tried to measure (though none of the batches got the same results); it was the AIR antenna which brought those programs for us. Though I was only yards away from the AIR I would listen to the radio once in a blue moon at some of my friend’s room. That time radio was struggling hard to retain its listeners. New programs like Phone-in programs were being introduced. With more walkman and cable TV at hostel we never bothered about radio. Later when I went to Bangalore for Infy training I was happy to find the FM radio still young and alive in that metro city. We roommates often listened to radio then. Though radio at Bangalore was concentrated on film music it still survived the harsh blows from multimedia.
Back at Trivandrum the radio helped us with its music during the initial stages when we were settling ourselves.
As soon as we bought the TV; the radio was never switch on. As I sat listening to the FM radio in the Techno park express the dusted pocket radio which lay on the parapet of our window came to my mind; I wondered how long I would hear this.