WANTED - NEW MEDIA FOR SOUTH ASIANS IN CANADA.

With their growing numbers poised to propel them into the 'biggest' visible minority position in Canada by the year 2017, it's puzzling how the South Asian market in Canada is so media-anaemic. The facts on the ground are startling. The 2 major cities of Toronto & Vancouver are served by almost no daily Hindi/Urdu Press, just a few hours of 'local' TV service tucked-away on borrowed main-stream channels per week, and some highly lukewarm radio programming.

The last mentioned is patchy at best. There are some sincere attempts at providing wholesome radio entertainment to home-sick South Asians but they are brought to naught with the shoddy handling of some others like this guy in Toronto during premium drive-time (evening hours) who hams his way through 2 excruciating hours of non-stop verbal diarrhoea. He multi-tasks between murdering some highly memorable songs (he fancies himself as a vocalist), playing the entire orchestra through his mouth (though he’s partial to drums & rhythm) and airing ‘songs & memories....’ of Indian musical maestros who are still alive and well in Bombay or somewhere in India. The famed Gandhian 'Ahimsa' is perhaps the only thing keeping listeners from marching to the channel headquarters and shutting him down.

(To be fair, not all radio programs are this bad. Some like the one in the morning drive time show, again in Toronto, are pretty good)

But the onus is still on us. We, the listeners/viewers/readers decide what should be allowed to continue and what mustn’t. And coming from India (unfortunately I am not very familiar with the Pak radio but can hypothesize that it must be very good) we know what good quality is. We have grown up on the ‘TOIs’ (Times of India) and ‘IEs’ (Indian Express), on the ‘Vividhbhartis’ and ‘Binaca Geet Malas’ , on the Ameen Sayanis (and Hameed Sayani, his brother, who used to do the ‘Bournvita Quiz Contest) and Pratap Sharmas....so how can we be happy with such mediocrity?

Why can we not recreate the Indian media magic right here in our adopted country?....With some true-blue Hindustani Radio & Television programming, honey 'n cream voices anchoring interestingly conceptualized programs....et al?!!

What do we do? Good question!

What we, as listeners/viewers/readers can do is to unite in demanding ‘better’ in every forum where we can possibly get our voices heard. This humble blogs is a step in that direction. Remember, there is no dearth of investors, entrepreneurs, journalists, publishers, musicians & creative media talent in the South Asian community. And they are right here in Canada amongst us. When we speak with one voice, we will provide them with a ‘clear need’. Hopefully, that could prove to be the catalyst for new media ventures and maybe something like a ‘Media Development Club' – a creative think-tank dedicated to developing media channels for the South Asian market in Canada.
Hey all you entrepreneurs & wonderfully talented media geniuses - we need you now. It's time to stand up and be counted. Mumbai-ishtyle – “Kya bolta hai bhidu?!!”