November 13, 2012 11:30
by Shelley Nolan Freesland
AWR Communication Director
Today [November 12, 2012], a Seventh-day Adventist program was broadcast for the first time on FM radio in India. The program was produced by Adventist World Radio (AWR) in the Telugu language, and was aired on a station in Hyderabad, India. The name of the program is Avennel, which means The Dawn in Telugu.
Adventist World Radio has just signed a contract with a broadcast agency for an initial series of 11 Telugu programs. Additional broadcasts in Hindi and English will follow in other large cities, such as Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Pune, Delhi, and others, as resources permit.
Hyderabad – known as India’s “cyber capital” – is a city of more than nine million people and has the largest Muslim population in India. After China, India is the second most-populated country in the world.
“This is a very significant step to reach the large cities in India, which comes after two years of intensive work negotiating with related agencies and preparing the programs,” says AWR president Dowell Chow. “Thanks to God and our faithful supporters, we are now blessed to be able to witness the opening of a new window of opportunity to reach the people of India with the gospel of salvation.”
This first program went on the air at 5:30 p.m. local time in Hyderabad. AWR currently broadcasts programs for Indian listeners in 13 languages, through shortwave radio, on demand, and podcasts.
Adventist World Radio is the official global radio ministry of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. Its mission is to broadcast the Adventist hope in Christ to the unreached people groups of the world in their own languages. AWR's programs can be heard in nearly 100 languages through AM/FM and shortwave radio, on demand, and podcasts at awr.org and iTunes.
AWR News, Picture: Wikipedia
