Section: This Native of Karnataka

The Voice From the Sky: The Struggle Behind India’s First Private Radio Station

On 10th September 1935, a small group assembled inside a house, called Vitthala Vihar, in Mysore.

In the middle of the room was a curious machine, a 30-watt Philips transmitter assembled by Dr M V Gopalaswamy, a psychology professor at Maharaja’s College. Most Indians still marveled at radio. There were few receivers. The broadcasting equipment was expensive. There was no certainty that anyone outside the neighbourhood would hear what he was about to send into the air.

Gopalaswamy turned on the transmitter.

We weren’t making news, or a government statement. Music. The performance featured the legendary Carnatic musician Mysore Vasudevacharya, with H. V. Rama Rao on violin and Venkatesh Devar on the mridangam. Their music invisibly crossed Mysore from a professor’s house and entered the radios of curious listeners.

Gopalaswamy referred to the station as Akashvani – “voice from the sky”.

Often touted as India’s first private radio broadcasting experiment, the station was established not to make a profit but to carry education, literature, music and culture beyond classrooms and concert halls. Its weak transmitter had a limited range, but the idea was enormous: one voice could reach many homes simultaneously.

It was difficult to keep up that voice.

Gopalaswamy ran the station for almost six years, allegedly, largely on his own money and with the help of friends. Without the resources of a major institution, programmes had to be organised, performers invited and equipment maintained. The money worries became too much eventually.

The station was first transferred to the Mysore municipality and then in 1942 to the Mysore princely administration. Gopalaswamy continued as director.

What was begun in the home of a Mysore couple had proved something extraordinary:

A voice didn’t need a stage to reach the city.

All it needed was a transmitter, and somebody brave enough to switch it on.