Direct channels to give free TV time slots for educational broadcast: Punjab Education Minister

Punjab government has asked Centre to direct all the TV channels to give two-hour free time slot every day for broadcasting educational lectures.

Punjab Education Minister Vijay Inder Singla has urged Centre to direct all the TV channel to give two-hour free time slot per day to the state government to broadcast educational lessons.

He gave this suggestion during a web conference with Union Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank and Minister for Communications, Electronics and Information Technology, and Law and Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad, an official statement stated.

He suggested that all the TV channels, including government, private and news channels, under the Disaster Management Act, 2005 should be directed to provide a free of cost two-hour time slot per day to state governments for educational broadcasts.

This is the need of the hours and to compensate for the academic loss due to the ongoing coronavirus lockdown to contain the spread of the virus. He said as the Disaster Management Act, 2005 is imposed in the country, the central government has all the rights reserved with it.

He also requested the Education Minister to provide at least four dedicated channels of Doordarshan to broadcast educational lectures for different classes. The channels should be made available for at least six hours a day followed by a repeat broadcast.

While talking about the issue of internet connectivity and availability that students are facing around the state, he said, all telecom companies should provide free internet service to achieve the target of providing free online classes to the poorest of the poor. 

To ease anxiety and stress levels of the students preparing for remaining board exams, he said class 10 students should be promoted based on their pre-board results and internal assessment, while class 12 students should be allowed to complete their examinations as early as possible.

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