The All India Radio (AIR) centre in the hill town of Kurseong, West Bengal, has been made the hub of content generation and transmission centre for Nepali languge radio broadcasting in India, starting April 1, 2023.

The decision was made following a meeting of the External Service Division (ESD) of All India Radio under the chairpersonship of DG (News).

The ESD of the AIR broadcasts programmes in 27 languages, including 15 foreign languages, and until now, the Nepali services of the ESD were being broadcast by Delhi AIR.

AIR’s Kurseong station, which had been established in 1962 earlier used to broadcast only local news in Nepali once a day at 6.50 pm. From Decmber last year, it started broadcasting news with national content in Nepali four times a day.

There has been a long standing demand in the Hills that AIR Kurseong be made the centre for content creation for the Nepali language as it would promote local artistes.

In a press release, Darjeeling MP Raju Bista said: “With this, our local talents, artistes, musicians, singers, lyricists, writers, dramatists, news readers, news producers, radio content creators will greatly benefit. Kurseong will become the heart of Nepali Language Radio broadcasting in India.”