New Delhi: The Indian Institute of Mass Communication, or IIMC, is an obvious choice for graduates wanting to pursue a career in journalism. This year, IIMC got 6,500 applications for the 282 seats on offer in its four flagship programmes, meaning that only four out of 100 applicants stand a chance of admission to the class of 2009-10.
Airing views: The Indian Institute of Mass Communication’s community radio, Apna Radio, gives students the opportunity to work on live projects. Harikrishna Katragadda / Mint
IIMC offers postgraduate diplomas in English journalism, Hindi journalism, radio and television journalism, and advertising and public relations.
The IIMC story began in 1962-63, when the government approached the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) and the Ford Foundation, seeking their help in establishing a platform to make effective use of communication for the country’s development.
The blueprint, prepared by a team of communication experts headed by Wilbur Schramm, the US scholar sometimes referred to as the “father of communication studies”, led to the birth of IIMC in 1965. Then information and broadcasting minister Indira Gandhi inaugurated the institute. Run from a small premises in New Delhi’s South Extension area, it offered just one journalism course.
“Over the years, many courses were added. Advertising-public relations was introduced in 1981, Hindi journalism in 1987, and radio and TV journalism in 1997. A branch was also opened in Dhenkanal (Orissa). It has taken a long time to establish the institute as a brand,” says J.S. Yadav, former director of IIMC, who was at the helm of the institute for 12 years starting 1987.
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Remembering his teachers at IIMC, Madhukar Upadhyay, a former BBC broadcaster and now chief editor of Hindi daily Aaj Samaj, says: “We had a distinguished faculty whom we just watched and learnt (from). They didn’t have to teach you. There was a certain aura (around them).” Upadhyay is a 1978 batch alumnus.
In the past three decades, mass media has undergone a revolution of sorts, and its reach, access and impact have increased manifold. IIMC, too, has seen many changes.
Today, the institute has two campuses—in New Delhi and Dhenkanal—a television studio, a printing press, a photo lab, one of Asia’s biggest mass communications libraries, and distinguished alumni. It also runs a community radio called Apna Radio, which gives students the opportunity to work on live projects.
“IIMC is one institution where there is a heavy emphasis on hands-on practical training,” says S. Raghavachari, professor of broadcast journalism at the institute.
NDTV anchorperson and reporter Nidhi Razdan, who was a student of the second radio-TV journalism batch in 1998, sums up why the institute attracts hundreds of students every year, “The name carries a lot of weight in the industry.”
But IIMC has had its share of problems.