NEW DELHI: Noting that mobile phones acted as a tool of empowerment to all sections of society, Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar has suggested that All India Radio could consider a customised news and related information to varied sections of the society.

Javadekar said the government has initiated innovative approaches in reaching out to the people through multiple media platforms.

The endeavour was to address the communication needs, to enter into a dialogue with different cross-sections of the society and address the aspirations of young people.

The Minister stated this while launching the free News SMS service of All India Radio News Services Division in four Indian languages - Assamese, Gujarati, Tamil and Malayalam – thus bringing the total number of languages covered by this service to 14.

Javadekar said the SMS services of AIR intended to provide instant communication to public in a language and form understood by them. The service reiterated the richness and reach of each of the languages introduced by AIR.

AIR had launched SMS service in English on 9 September last year and in five other languages on 19 September this year – Hindi, Marathi, Dogri, Sanskrit and Nepali – to provide AIR News on mobile sets to its subscribers free of cost. The service has already touched the database of over three lakh subscribers. 

This newly launched service can be availed by registering on the website of All India Radio viz. http://newsonair.nic.in/smsservice . SMS can also be sent for registration in following format to 7738299899:

AIR<space>NAME<dash>AGE<dash>GENDERCODE<dash>LANGUAGECODE

Different codes for the SMS are as follows:

GENDER CODES: M for Male    and    F for Female

LANGUAGE CODES: A for Assamese,  G for Gujarati, ML for Malayalam, T for Tamil, H for Hindi, M for Marathi, D for Dogri, S for Sanskrit, N for Nepali.