The Last Post

With the threat of closure looming large, BBC’s Tamil service celebrated its 70th anniversary a few months ago. Started as a  “A news letter from Ceylon”, broadcasting once a  week, BBC Tamil service began its daily broadcasts only in 1990 when the civil war between the Sri Lankan Tamil rebels, the LTTE and the government was intensifying.

The broadcast was global in nature, covering international news and analysis. The contents were mostly translations from the main English broadcasts and maintained a high standard of objectivity and journalism. The broadcasters of the service were scholars in Tamil with little journalistic experience who believed in showing off their literary skills and command over the language in their translations which sometimes affected the objectivity and fairness of the news. To listeners  with little knowledge of  English, BBC’s Tamil service was a boon as they could boast of having listened to the best of broadcasters.

With a draconian censorship imposed in Sri Lanka, the Tamils in Sri Lanka and the huge Tamil diaspora, all over the world depended entirely on the Tamil service for a fair and unbiased news about the civil war in the island. The LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran was an ardent and avid listeners of Tamil service. Veerappan even sent a cassette containing a message detailing the atrocities committed by the police against the villagers to me in 1995. The maximum listening was in Sri Lanka that was ravaged by the civil war. The BBC entered into an agreement with the Sri Lankan Broadcasting Corporation to relay its Sinhalese and Tamil broadcasts through its local FM stations.

At one point, there were charges – not totally unfounded, that the broadcasts were pro LTTE and the Sri Lankan government used to stop the broadcasts whenever it found them going against them. Listening was the maximum among the Tamils of Sri Lanka and naturally the broadcasts covered more of Sri Lanka even though there were just about seven hundred thousand Tamils as against 8 million living in Tamil Nadu.

There was a move to close down the Tamil service in early eighties but the Tamil lobby in the UK (mostly Sri Lankan Tamils), with the help of labour MPs stalled it.

With the proliferation of English and regional TV channels in India, radio listening has come down. People do not have the patience to tune to the short wave broadcasts which are very often noisy or inaudible. BBC wanted to have a foothold in the booming FM markets and has been trying to get their prgrammes relayed by the local FM stations.

BBC World Service is known for its news content and Indian government is reluctant to allow news broadcasts through the private FM stations, let alone a foreign station in.

At present BBC gives an hourly one minute capsule of sports and entertainment whose content and production are not of the BBC standard and pales against the local FM programmes. Listening in Sri Lanka has also come down drastically with the end of the civil war and the death of the LTTE leader in 2008. What happens in Srilanka is no longer of any interest to the diaspora either. There are numerous Tamil broadcasting stations in Europe run by Sri Lankans. There are several web sites giving the latest news and BBC Tamil service has lost its sheen, not able to cope with these. Listenership in Tamil Nadu has almost come to a nil, except for some diehard old time listeners.

By the time the Tamil broadcast starts at 9.15 pm, the news events are no longer of interest. The numerous 24 hour news channels would have broadcast them with the latest updates, interviews and analyses.Operating from London, the Tamil Service finds it difficult to get interviewees and sound bites and this makes it even less interesting.

Those who were listening to the Tamil broadcast for its international content are also disappointed as the broadcasts these days cover very  few international analysis and instead focus on local events competing with the local TV and radio even though BBC has less resources.

The Tamil Service   has survived so far because BBC may not save much by closing it-its annual budget is 2 lakhs pounds while the entire BBC’s budget is 253 million pounds. For considerable savings now, BBC might consider closing a few more language services, perhaps after the prestigious Olympic games are over and sources say that the Tamil Service may exist only as a web site operating from India-Tamil Nadu.