Podcast: Pre-Partition stories, filmi music made Radio Ceylon a household name in India and Pakistan

What might Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of British India, have to do with the popularity of filmi music? Quite a bit, it turns out. During the Second World War, Mountbatten, then supreme Allied commander in the Southeast Asian theatre, set up his headquarters in Ceylon. He brought along a powerful shortwave transmitter: an official report had recently suggested that demoralised British soldiers might benefit from more beer, cigarettes, and better radio programming.

A few years later, the government of independent Ceylon used the same transmitter to set up Radio Ceylon, “The King of the Airwaves”. Between the 1950s and 1970s, Radio Ceylon became a household name in India and Pakistan, introducing millions of listeners to the latest soundtracks from Bollywood.

This story is one of the many unexpected connections which Isabel Huacuja Alonso forges in Radio for the Millions, a history of radio broadcasting in South Asia. The airwaves of India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka are of a relatively lower decibel today. But before television and the internet, radio was a powerful force in shaping the region’s cultural and political landscape.

Take the Second World War as an example. One of Louis Mountbatten’s primary nemeses...

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