Satellite TV in India

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Discuss the changes that have taken place in the production and consumption of television programmes in India in recent years.

Before satellite was introduced to India, people there used to save all of their money for their children’s education and marriage, which was the traditional thing to do. They also used to watch a lot of traditional, classical television.

The broadcasting system in India was government run and hadn’t changed since 1947, when India became independent. Britain had left behind their model of a State regulated broadcasting system. The Indian government decided to use this same model but they got rid of the systems aim to entertain the audience, meaning they were left with just to educate and inform the audience. The Indian broadcasting system was called Doordarshan.

        All Doordarshan programmes were government run and had to have a social message. News was highly censored because the government didn’t want to show anything that represented India in a bad way. Classical music was played for breakfast and the only dramas where those based on Indian myths, such as Mahabarata.

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There were only four channels available at prime time and they were all run by Doordarshan.

During the Gulf War, the people of India wanted to know about what was going on seeing as their country was involved. They were sick of being left in the dark and wanted to know what was happening to their people. This was the beginning of Satellite TV.

Soon Indians where being exposed to all sorts of media, which their normal Doordarshan channel didn’t show. Satellite had impacted hugely on society and at one point it was growing faster in India than ...

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