How to Start FM Radio Station in India?

Ever wanted to start your own FM radio station in India? Are your aspirations to launch an FM radio station in India sincere? This is a comprehensive manual for you! To do so, you must obtain MIB’s consent (Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India). Except for the MIB, no one else has the authority to grant this license. You can begin your broadcast on the frequency once you receive the WPC’s final approval (Radio FM). The government decided to start FM radio in India to broadcast independent stations in 2011 to cover 294 cities and a total of 839 FM radio channels! As a result, you must first bid on and purchase your FM megahertz radio station frequency from the reserve prices that the Indian government has set. Additionally, you can proceed with buying your FM transmitter and antenna, setting up the audio equipment, and beginning your radio’s FM broadcast.

A commercial FM radio station in India starts at 50 lakhs and costs up to 25 crores. (Examples: 98.3 FM Radio Mirchi, 94.3 MY FM). The policy and instructions provided by the MIB, Government of India, for obtaining your FM License are available for easy download in PDF format!

Do Checkout our Blog on How to Start an Internet Radio Station.

Ease of Setup: FM Radio versus Internet Radio

This article will teach you how to launch an FM radio station and how to create your own online radio station. India’s radio industry is booming! This is a result of Prime Minister Mr. Narendra’s Maan Ki Baat program only airs on the radio instead of on television. It goes without saying that radio, which employs on-air frequencies, is the earliest form of audio communication (AIR & Akashvani). Everyone is welcome, and it is entirely free. In times of need, it is very efficient and uses few resources.

Since the cost of an FM radio frequency is high, Riggro Digital has developed Internet radio technology to enable anyone who wants to start their own radio station to do so online or through the internet. Unlike other online radio stations, ours only broadcast at 2 kbps. On our platforms, a large number of FM radio stations and community radio stations are broadcasting. With Auto DJ, they can broadcast live with the help of wonderful, simple tools like automation and scheduling software. As a result, they can reduce their operational costs by up to 90%.

By connecting our Android apps to their transmitters, they are using our radio hosting services to stream audio on their FM radio stations. Broadcasting solutions for FM Radios using cloud automation and the internet

Our client, Radio Parbhani, has expressed:

“We have been using Riggro Digital’s cloud automation radio broadcasting services, and we are very pleased with them. We are using the cloud to broadcast our FM radio station. We are able to reduce our FM radio station’s operating costs by 90% and there is surprisingly less human dependency. “

History of Internet radio stations

Carl Malamud introduced the first Internet radio on June 24, 1993. He began hosting a talk online radio show from his computer. On June 24, 1993, Severe Tire Damage was the first musical group to perform live via internet radio. The Irish society globally then had direct connections to an Irish online news radio broadcaster later in 1994. The first significant concert to be broadcast on online radio was the Rolling Stones performance in November 1994.. WXYC (89.3 FM Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA) was the first analog terrestrial radio station to broadcast online on November 7, 1994. To learn more about the history of Internet radio stations, click here.

Riggro Digital launched its first internet radio station in India called Radio Namkin. Currently, we have over 3 million-plus internet radio users across the world! All of our radio stations are available on numerous international radio platforms, websites, and apps, including radio. garden, RadiosIndia.com, Radio.net, Streema, TuneIn Radio, and apktume.com

Since neither spectrum nor frequencies are necessary, there is no license needed to launch an Internet radio station from the MIB. Internet radios make use of the user’s web connection, for which they already pay.So as of now, the MIB has nowhere stated any license for starting an Internet radio or online radio station.

Procedure for Starting FM Radio Stations in India?

According to TENDER No. 212/14/2005 – FM, the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting is currently accepting sealed bids for Phase II of the expansion to start FM Radios in India through private companies.

The government has also started Phase III to start private FM radio stations in India in all cities with a population of more than 1 lakh people in order to increase the reach of FM Radio broadcasting in the nation. According to the cities’ grades, there was a bidding range of about Rs. 50 lakhs to Rs. 25 crore for this project. A few examples are Mumbai, Nasik, and Agra.

What are the Permissions and investments required to set up and start FM Radio Stations in India?

You must pay a one-time, non-refundable entry fee to access the channels (NOTEF). NOTEF stands for the capital expenditure of an FM radio station operator. Operational expenses and yearly license fees are also accounted for in NOTEF. Similar to this, the potential for revenue generation in a given city or coverage area strongly influences the Reserved Price (RP) or bid prices for starting FM radio stations in any city in India. Due to their smaller populations (under 1 lakh) and individual strategic importance, the Cabinet approved the RP for the remaining 11 cities at Rs. 5 lakhs.

The highest bid price was received for that city in Phase II for new channels in existing FM cities.
Additionally, the reserved price will be determined for new cities using a variety of methods, including the valuation of the FM station, the GSDP (Gross State Domestic Product), valuation based on listenership, and valuation based on the potential for revenue generation.

CITIES AND NUMBERS OF FM RADIO CHANNELS IN INDIA.

To start an FM radio station, the license is currently up for bids from Indian companies on a total of 338 channels in 91 cities across the nation. On the website of this Ministry, www.mib.nic.in, you can find the list of cities, categories, and the number of channels obtainable for bidding in each city.
Every applicant will be permitted to submit a bid for just one FM radio station license per city, as long as the total number of channels allotted to them does not exceed 15% of all the channels allotted in India.

Eligibility for those wishing to launch an FM Radio station (India)

Foreign Investment

Total foreign investment in the applicant company, including FDI from overseas corporate bodies, non-resident Indians, persons of Indian origin, etc., and portfolio investments by foreign institutional investors (FII), within limits set by the RBI, shall not exceed 20% of the entity’s paid-up equity, subject to the following requirements for an FM radio license in India.

1: Excluding equity held by banks and other lending institutions, more than 50% of the paid-up equity in the applicant entity is owned by one Indian person or business.
2: The applicant entity is managed under the majority shareholder’s authority.
3: The applicant entity’s board of directors is made up entirely of Indian residents.
4: All of the applicant entity’s top executives are Indian residents.

Eligibility

The following criteria will be used to determine the applicant’s financial eligibility for the purpose of awarding channels to FM radio stations that they wish to launch in all four regions:

One channel must have at least net wealth in each city and region as follows:

The applicant company that wishes to start FM radio stations shall submit audited final accounts for the last three years or, in the case of a newly incorporated company, balance sheets from the date of incorporation through March 31, 2005.
A company that is applying and was registered after March 31, 2005, must show evidence of its financial standing as of September 30, 2005.

DISQUALIFICATIONS

• Companies that are not Indian corporations.
• Whatever business is owned or controlled by a person who has been found guilty of a crime involving moral turpitude, who has been declared insolvent, or who has filed to be declared so;
• A business related to or under the control of a trust, society, or nonprofit organization;
• A business owned or managed by a group of religious people;
• Any business that a political entity owns or that is connected to one;
• Any business that is controlled by, or the business that acts as an advertising agency, is an associate of an advertising agency, is under its control, or is a person connected to an advertising agency; connected to a political body;

• A business applicant’s subsidiary based in the same city;
• Any applicant’s holding company located in the same city;
• Companies within a city that share the same management;
• Multiple Interconnected Projects in the Same City
• Any business that has been prohibited from participating in the bidding process due to a Phase I default or that is an associated business run by the same management.
• The Phase-I defaulters who have contested the cancellation of their Letters of Intent/License Agreements remain barred from taking part in any future bidding process in accordance with Phase policy.