PASIGHAT, Mar 6: Akashvani Pasighat, the first Radio station of Arunachal Pradesh, celebrated its 60th Foundation Day on Thursday (March 5) in a simple yet impressive ceremony organized at its office premises.
I D Pertin, IB(P)S and local administrative head (Akashvani Pasighat), dwelt at length on the legacy and epic journey of the Radio station. He called upon the staff, casual assignees, radio jockeys associated with Akashvani Pasighat to be well acquainted with the fast changing scenarios of broadcasting.
The first station of All India Radio in Arunachal Pradesh (Then NEFA) was inaugurated at the historical town of Pasighat on 6th March, 1966. It was inaugurated by Late Kuttik Moyong, Political Assistant and a renowned social and political figure of that time. Initially the power of the transmitter was only 1.5 Watt covering only the township of Pasighat. The Office, Studio and Transmitter was all set up in one SP type wooden government quarter near the present SP`s office Pasighat.
Late M N Raichaudhury, Programme Executive, who later retired as DDG, HQs New Delhi, was the first Programme Head of the station. He joined in January 1966. Late P K Singh, Assistant Engineer, who joined in February 1966, was the first Engineering Head. Jatin Morang and Late Takit Darang joined as regular announcers on 1st December, 1966. The station began its broadcast with Assamese as its medium of broadcast.
Akashvani Pasighat has a very rich collection of folk song, particularly of the Adi community, some of which are very exclusive and rare. The station has in its archival collection voices of Late Daying Ering, Oshong Ering, Talom Rukbo`s poetical series – The Baali Appun and numerous modern songs of prominent Adi and Galo artists. The artist whose voice was recorded first at the studio of AIR, Pasighat in 1966 was Late Okir Gao and late Maktem Yirang who presented a Ponung (Adi folk song). The 1st Bari folk song was recorded by Tamer Moyong and Delong by Osek Moyong. The name of AIR, Pasighat came to limelight in 1969 with the beginning of the broadcast of a 5 minute Adi news bulletin at 5.30 PM which was relayed from AIR, Dibrugarh then.
All India Radio Pasighat was upgraded to 10 KW in 1991. It was formally inaugurated later by former Chief Minister Gegong Apang on 27th January, 1996.
Another important change occurred to the station in 1996 with the introduction of Adi dialect as the station’s language of broadcast in place of Assamese. The station started Hard Disk Based Recording (HDBR) in 2004, probably one of the first stations to do so in the entire North Eastern Region.
Ojing Megu, Engineering Head and M Lemjan Phom, PEX (Coordination) also spoke on the occasion. (DIPRO)