Make media democratic, says 2014 Google Digital Activism Award winner Shubhranshu Choudhary

A few weeks ago when Shubhranshu Choudhary was informed that he was nominated alongside US whistleblower Edward Snowden for the 2014 Digital Activism Award he turned to his team and guffawedCGNet Swara founder Shubhranshu Choudhry centre with members of the Gond tribe in Chattisgarh Pics courtesy Shubhranshu ChoudharyFormer BBC journalist Choudhary is the founder of CGNet Swara an organisation which uses mobile phones to help Chattisgarhrsquos Gond tribe record and listen to news in their native language It wasnrsquot that Choudhary was not chuffed at being nominated ldquoBut come on bagging the award over Snowden The very thought sounded ridiculous back thenrdquo he says over the telephone from Bhopal on Tuesday a day before flying to London to receive the award Choudhary is a Knight International Journalism Fellow and has worked at The Guardian tooGiving a voice to thousandsChoudhary founded Bhopalbased CGNet Swara simply because he thought that journalism in the hands of a ldquofew aristocratsrdquo is not journalism at all ldquoThatrsquos the recipe to leave your own people out like the Gond community in Chattisgarh whom I work with Thatrsquos failed journalismrdquo emphasises ChoudharyEven the Maoists he points out print magazines in local languages in the area ldquoWhy canrsquot we do the samerdquo Choudhary says that it is the seemingly small issues of locals in insurgencystricken areas which when left unsolved push them to take up armsCGNet Swararsquos success is undeniable mdash it receives 400 calls everyday from citizen journalists and locals alikeThousands of Gonds have acquired civic amenities and medical attention due to the network but Choudhary insists on calling CGNet Swara an experiment ldquoI will term this success when more Indian communities come together and replicate our model as a sustainable model of communication an inexpensive project owned and run by peoplerdquo says ChoudharyRadio for democracyChoudhary hopes the award attracts partners who could help his team with something they have been fighting for since their inception in 2008 mdash linking CGNet Swara with shortwave radio ldquoCGNet Swara as an initiative is incomplete unless people cannot access it over radio The government does not allow broadcasting news over radio mdash how do you make news democratic to reach the majority of your country without a medium as inexpensive and pervasive as radiordquo demands Choudhary ldquoIt is ridiculous that a country whose tradition is largely oral thinks radio can be dangerousrdquoThe model he adds has worked well abroad and he hopes an international partner gives them space in their shortwave transmitter which has a footprint in India ldquoThe governmentrsquos rule is currently creating the largest gap in dissemination of news Mobile phones and the internet are expensive and no tools for mass communication in Indiardquo feels Choudhary adding that only 07 per cent of Chhatisgarh is onlineChoudhary and team are working on tapping the citizen band on radio which is a small bandwidth between 269 to 272 MHz that the government has kept free for citizens to use without making profit Choudhary has acquired transmitters from France and is now working on the obvious snag mdash expensive receivers and the short range available for the frequency ldquoCurrently the receivers cost R5000 We want to bring the cost down to R50 Also the government has put restrictions on the usage of power which means that the range of transmission is a mere fiveseven kmrdquo Since the past few months students of IITKharagpur have been working on ways to extend the range to at least 25 km using five watts of power The college will award the winning team R1 lakhWorldrsquos first Gondi websiteChoudhary is also working on Swasthya Swara which combines mobile and internet technologies to curate traditional health remedies from locals who could record and access them over the telephone and onlineHowever the initiative Choudhary is most excited about at the moment is the worldrsquos first website in Gondi script ldquoIn February we launched the website wwwadivasiswaraorg which has digitised the script of the Gonds The tribe is found in Chattisgarh Andhra Pradesh Orissa and Maharashtra and at the moment Maoists are the only ones who cater to them by publishing literature in Gondi We feel we must tap communities whose traditions are transmitted orally and are under great threatrdquo says ChoudharyChoudhary believes that we must be prepared to pay the price to receive news which is unbiased in nature and formldquoAt the moment news is controlled by a select few businessmen so we are left to consume the bits they throw our way But if we donrsquot shirk from paying for our news and elect our journalists rather than a few people selecting them for us news will truly become democraticrdquo