Abstract
This paper examines the BBC’s broadcasting activities during the year of India’s independence, offering a contribution to the existing scholarship on religious violence in the subcontinent and its role in the Partition. It provides a novel auditory history of the coverage of communal violence, particularly in the context of the BBC’s own impending division of assets. By focusing on a specific historical moment and the locus of colonialism, this study illuminates the complex relationship between colonial media and the imperial administration. It reveals how the Labour government sought to utilize the BBC’s airwaves to facilitate a smooth withdrawal from the Indian subcontinent, despite agreeing to a Partition along communal lines. Drawing on rare archival materials, including government documents and BBC records, this paper argues that the BBC’s colonial policy evolved inconsistently over time, revealing significant nuances in its approach. By outlining the factors behind the shift in administrative communal policy, the paper links this change to the formulation of the BBC’s editorial policy in 1947. Given the period’s instability and rapid transformation, which culminated in the division of BBC services in the subcontinent, the paper demonstrates how changing socio-economic and political conditions influenced the editorial stance adopted by the Corporation in response to administrative communal policies. Within the broader framework of colonial media studies, this paper explores the dynamics between a once tightly controlled colonial media institution and a withdrawing administration in the context of impending independence.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Radio History in India, Post-colonial Media, Communalism, Empire and Communication
