SATELLLITE INSTRUCTIONAL TELEVISION EXPERIMENT SITE

SATELLLITE INSTRUCTIONAL TELEVISION EXPERIMENT SITE

In 1969 the Department of Atomic Energy entered into an agreement with the Naitonal Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) of the US for the loan of a satellite free of cost for one full year starting from August 1975. it was the first experiment ever to relay educational television programmes direct from a satellite to receivers in 2400 villages scattered over six selected regions in Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

The four-hour telecast beamed every day from earth station at Delhi and Ahmedabad concentrated on programmes on education, agriculture, health and family planning.

The ISRO (Indian Space Research Organization) set up its own Audio-Visual Instruction Division to plan and produce programmes according to schedule.

Satellite had only one video channel and two audio channels. It could transmit just one picture at a time with synchronised sound in two different languages.

SITE had an ambitious goal in promoting new agricultural practices. It broadcast programmes on agriculture from 30 minutes each day for each linguistic group, plus 30 minutes entertainment programmes in Hindi.

Objectives of SITE:
• Gain experience in the development, testing and management of satellite-based
instructional television system particularly in rural areas and to determine
optimal system parameters.
• Demonstrate the potential value of satellite technology in the rapid development
of effective communications in developing countries
• Demonstrate the potential value of satellite broadcast TV in the practical
instruction of village inhabitants
• Stimulate national development in India, with important managerial, economic
technological and social implications.

Systems management
The TV sets, augmented with 10 feet parabolic antennae and front-end converters, had been placed in isolated villages in parts of six states in India - Rajasthan, Bihar, Orissa, Madyha Pradesh, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Pij village in Gujarat acquired the first rural TV transmitter in India which provided programmes in local language along with common programmes from Delhi via satellite. TV sets in and around Delhi and Amritsar also received programmes beamed from Ahmedabad via satellite in addition to those telecast locally.

While most community sets were deployed in electrified villages, about 150 battery operated sets were deployed in unelectrified villages as part of the experiment. In addition to the Direct Reception system/Set (DRS), some conventional transmitters also rebroadcast the satellite programmes. An elaborate system was setup to deploy, maintain and operate the community sets. The maintenance was found to be extremely successful and ensured very high availability figures.

It was during SITE that special attention was directed towards children in the age group of 5-12. A systematic credo was worked out, and programmes were produced, mainly with the objective of helping children to learn community living skills; installing habits of hygiene and healthy living; promoting aesthetic senility; and making children aware of the entire process of the modernization of life and society around.

Science education programme
The scientists of Space Applications Centre Ahmedabad, and the Indian Space Research Organization ISRO thought that one thing really worth giving to the rural child, would be an awareness of his/her surroundings and an understanding of what it is all about. Science education programmes were conceived with the following aims:
• To make children realize that science is everywhere; that their immediate
environment can be questioned, understood, explained and manipulated by them,
using the scientific method.
• To emphasize the learning of the scientific method, more than mere transfer of
information.

These programmes were produced at a studio in Mumbai. 160 science programmes of about 10-12 minutes each were produced in Hindi and dubbed in Oriya.

Almost 1200 minutes of Gujarati programmes for Pij transmitter were also produced.

These science programmes were protested at Madyha Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, and Mumbai.

An important feature of the science educational programme was the inclusion of a behavioral scientist/developmental scientist in the production team to do formative research.

Major findings emerging from the evaluations were:
It is possible to deploy operate and maintain community TV sets and DRS even in remote areas of a country, and that too with an availability of 80-90%

Community viewing is possible, and that average audience sizes of 80-100 can be expected.

Instructional programmes were preferred in comparison to pure entertainment programmes

Community access to TV tends to narrow the communications- effects gap.

Overall SITE established that the extension of communications infrastructure to remote is not only feasible, but that it can contribute concretely to promoting national development.

Lessons
The experiment was considered as a learning experience to design, produce and telecast relevant educational and developmental programs to widely spread areas with different problems and languages using, on a time sharing mode, a single broadcast channel.

Many of the viewers of SITE programmes were first generation mass media participants, in the sense that they were never exposed to radio, newspapers or cinema. Most of the first generation mass media participants were illiterate and came from the poorer sections of the rural society. SITE was more effective than all other media in attracting the female audience.

The experiment was particularly successful in focused programmes such as those involving teacher training and training of field workers. It might be mentioned that 50,000 rural teachers were exposed during SITE to a multi media package for training in teaching of science and Mathematics.

A number of lessons were learnt on efficacy of various types of programmes the use of inexpensive portable equipments for decentralized participatory programme production, and in regard to problems of programming in situations where rural and urban audiences are mixed.

SITE was an exhilarating experience for everyone involved. It brought a large number of scientists, engineers, sociologists and programmers close to the rural reality. It provided a practical example of how a large number of agencies with different basic disciplines can work a close partnership. The happening of SITE gave permanent rural orientation to Indian Broadcasting.