On September 15, 1959, television was first broadcast in India on a trial basis for three days a week. Only instructional broadcasts for a small region around New Delhi were included in the scope of the programmes. There were 180 tele clubs set up within a 40-kilometre radius of the transmitter. Every club received a television from UNESCO. The engineering and the software for the programming were supplied by All India Radio.

Due to two factors, the Indian government decided to establish TV on an experimental basis, firstly, to provide staff with this new technological training and, secondly, to learn how television may promote community development.

At this early stage, television was largely seen as a teaching instrument rather than an entertainment medium. The television project received financial help from the Indian government. Teachers’ television programmes first debuted in 1961. Television programmes started to be broadcast regularly in 1965. During this year, a daily, one-hour service was initiated.

1972-1982

The medium experienced a tremendous expansion between 1972 and 1982. Bombay received television services in 1972. The Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE), which was launched in 1975–1976, brought television to 2,400 villages in underdeveloped regions of Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and Orissa. 

One of the world’s largest communication experiments, according to descriptions of this initiative Television broadcasting was separated from All India Radio in 1976 and placed under a separate agency called Doordarshan.

AFTER 1982

The colour transition to Doordarshan began on August 15, 1982. Additionally, a regular satellite link between Delhi and various transmitters was established this year. The Asian Games that were hosted in New Delhi in 1982 served as the primary catalyst for these improvements.

Since 1982, television infrastructure has been quickly increasing, and for a brief time, the nation received a new transmitter every single day. Over time, there have been a lot more transmitters and centres for producing television programmes. In New Delhi, a second channel was introduced on November 19, 1984. Later, the Metro entertainment channel launched on April 1, 1993. Doordarshan currently broadcasts content on 19 channels. The main channel, or DD-1, is Doordarshan’s flagship.

SATELLITE INSTRUCTIONAL TELEVISION EXPERIMENT (SITE)

Since its foundation in 1959, Indian Television has produced content that is aligned with the social, agricultural, economic, and political objectives of the government. Programming executives followed the lead of Indian politicians and ignored television’s entertaining appeal in favour of its instructional and informative value.

When Doordarshan, still a part of AIR, started the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE), one of the most ambitious undertakings in television history, this predisposition for moral, useful, and instructive programming became even more obvious. Vikram Sarabhai, a renowned physicist and the head of the Indian Atomic Energy Commission, was the inspiration behind SITE. In order to introduce satellite television to India, Sarbhai urged the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the United States to collaborate. He also authorised India to use the NASA Application Technology Satellite (ATS-6) for the duration of the one-year trial.

Doordarshan transmitted farm, health and hygiene, and family planning programmes to 2400 villages in rural India via the ATS-6 satellite from August 1, 1975, to July 31, 1976. Additionally, entertainment programmes, primarily featuring rural art, music, and dancing, were broadcast on SITE. The majority of the time, because so few people had their own TVs, they watched SITE programming in public spaces with TVs that were specifically set up for viewing.

The main goal of SITE was to bring together the various and multilingual audiences of the country by exposing them to one another’s cultures, in addition to educating people about solutions to the challenges facing the nation.

At production facilities in New Delhi, Hyderabad, and Cuttack, SITE programmes were created with the assistance of university professors, social workers, and other professionals. A division of the DAE called the Indian Space and Research Organisation (ISRO) also contributed to the production of some of the shows. The televisions used for the experiment were installed and maintained by ISRO as well. Generally speaking, these sets were just regular television sets with a front-end converter and a chicken-mesh antenna for receiving satellite signals.

The outcomes of SITE were less impressive than its plans. A 1980 assessment by Krishan Sondhi said that the farm schemes had less of an effect than anticipated. Because they had already learned about the improvements via AIR’s farm bulletins and programming, farmers in SITE viewing areas were not more innovative than farmers who were not exposed to SITE programmes. Another flaw was that the farm programmes were not useful to farmers since they were not adjusted to the vastly different farming methods used in the SITE viewing zones. The family planning and health efforts did not yield notable advancements either.

PRASAR BHARATHI

Since its founding, Doordarshan has been a government-controlled institution. When television experimentation began in India in 1959, Doordarshan was merely an addendum to All India Radio. Despite being cut off from All India Radio in 1976, Doordarshan now has direct oversight from the Indian government’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. 

The different governments at the centre not only had influence over the electronic media but also used it to advance their own covert goals. In order to stifle opposition and advance personality cults, political leaderships have allegedly misused All India Radio and Doordarshan (television) for blatantly partisan and personal purposes, according to I.B. Singh. This has been true for each and every New Delhi-based government since they have come into power.

The quest for broadcast media autonomy was gaining more and more momentum. In order to provide the country’s broadcast media autonomy, the National Front Government, led by Mr. V.P. Singh, tabled the bill in the first Parliamentary session in January 1990. The Prasar Bharathi Act, however, was not implemented for seven years. 

Finally, on September 22, 1997, the Act became operative. In order to give Doordarshan and All India Radio autonomy, the Prasar Bharathi Board was established.

A volcano’s eruption releases molten rock (lava), gases, rock fragments, ash, and other volcanic material onto the surface of the ground. Volcanism is the term for the phenomenon where the aforementioned substances are released onto the surface of the ground. Both the negative and positive impacts of volcanism exist.

Constructive effects

Fertile soil: 

When volcanoes erupt, ash is released onto the Earth’s surface close to the eruption site. The soil nutrients in the ash vary depending on the type of magma that was released from the volcano and how it was disseminated. Silica and oxygen are the nutrients that are most frequently found. This ash improves the soil and acts as a fertiliser for it. Certain volcanic rocks are also ejected onto the surface of the Earth as a result of volcanism. Magnesium, potassium, and iron are frequently abundant in these rocks, further enhancing the soil’s fertility.

Contact Metamorphism: 

In geology, metamorphism is the alteration of a rock body’s structure from that of which it was originally produced. The temperature of the rocks is raised when magma, which is emitted as a result of volcanism, interacts with them. They end up getting contaminated by magma fluid as a result. Contact metamorphism is the term for this process. Rocks like marbles and hornfels are produced as a result of it.

 Land formation: 

New materials are forced onto the surface of the Earth by a volcanic eruption through volcanism. New landforms result from this. For instance, the Hawaiian Islands were created as a result of numerous volcanic eruptions over the same area. The Aleutian Islands, the Mariana Islands, the Ryukyu Islands, and many other islands were all created as a result of volcanic eruptions.

Emission of gases: 

During volcanism, a large number of gases are released. The most significant of these is sulphur dioxide. This gas transforms into sulfuric acid aerosols as it reaches the stratosphere. When tiny water-based particles are released into the atmosphere, like when fog forms, the result is an aerosol. These aerosols rapidly coat the atmosphere and linger there for many years. This causes a cooling effect, which lowers the temperature.

Volcanic lakes: 

Occasionally, a sizable crater is created on the surface of the Earth as a result of huge volcanic eruptions. These craters frequently become submerged in water once the volcano ceases to be active. Rain, groundwater flow, or any other mechanism could cause this. These are frequently referred to as crater lakes.

Destructive effects

Earthquakes: 

The movement of magma, which is located under a volcano’s surface, frequently causes earthquakes. In order for the material inside the volcano to be spread across the surface of the land during an eruption, the magma begins to move towards the Earth. Large earthquakes may result from this shift. Because of this, living near a volcano can be exceedingly dangerous and puts people’s lives in the immediate region at risk. Large ground fractures could result from earthquakes, which could result in several fatalities and considerable property damage.
 

Effects on climate: 

Because of the gas eruptions that take place during volcanism, volcanic eruptions have a significant impact on the climate of the world. Once in the atmosphere, the gases have a significant impact on the world and cause erratic weather.

Pyroclastic Flows: 

A volcanic eruption frequently produces “pyroclastic flows,” which are hot gas clouds. It is made mostly of detritus and tiny volcanic rocks. They move at an incredibly fast pace and have an incredibly high temperature. They instantly kill anyone who is caught in them or comes into contact with them.

Volcanic ash: 

Volcanic ash frequently contains volcanic glass in addition to numerous microscopic rock and mineral bits. If breathed in, these have a severe negative impact on both human and animal life.

Conclusion

Volcanism is the process through which a volcano erupts and spews material onto the surface of the planet. It is a noteworthy geological event that has both considerable positive and negative effects. In its wake, a volcanic eruption causes extensive property damage and human casualties. For those residing close to the eruption site, it takes several years for its effects to pass and for life to return to normal. In addition, it generates many dangerous aerosols, large-scale earthquakes, and pyroclastic flows. The creation of new landforms, the development of more fertile soils, the formation of new lakes, etc. are all examples of how volcanic eruptions have benefited the globe over time. As a result, despite their initial appearance as being highly destructive, volcanoes actually have a lot of positive and advantageous consequences for the earth.