Podbharti…first Hindi podcast channel…reminds of 1970s style radio

Podbharti is India’s first Hindi podcasting channel and it went live last month. Started by two Hindi bloggers Debashish Chakrabarty (who is a prolific Hindi blogger) and Shashi Singh, this is targeted at Hindi audience in India or abroad, through its coverage of news and views about Indian blogging, technology, current affairs and entertainment. It follows in the footsteps of earlier launched India centric podcasting channels like Podtech, Indicast, Kamla Bhatt Show, Podmasti, Podbazaar with one difference- its in Hindi and hence is seeking to appeal to a different audience.

Check out one of Podbharti’s podcast from the embedded player below. The audio quality is great (having done podcasting myself, I can tell you that this is not easy, specially if you are recording over the internet). Moreover, the tone and style of the podcast is highly reminiscent of 1970-80s style radio, somewhat like Amin Sayani’s famous shows. Read through the comments on Podbharti’s posts and you will realize that this audience is clearly savoring the podcast’s content & style. You can listen to the podcasts on the web or download it into your mp3 player. And while I don’t have specific info about the website’s future monetization strategy, I think it has to be based on advertising- pre-roll, contextual PPC etc.

And take a look at the header on Podbharti’s website (screenshot above). You can’t miss the bullock cart, that gives the site an unmistakable Indian touch. Not to miss out the Indian map, which incidentally is very similar to India’s map on Webyantra’s header.

At an overall level, Podbharti is a sign that podcasting has arrived in India. The early adopters (people like Kiruba Shankar, Kamla Bhatt etc) are playing a crucial part in popularizing it. Given the inherent strengths of podcasting as a medium – higher perceived credibility, available anytime on demand, portability in cell phones, music players etc, its only time when mainstream Indian internet portals like Rediff, Indiatimes jump into this big time with their own channels. Its possible that some of the current Indian podcasting websites could create content for them, either directly or on a syndicated basis.

Previous posts about Indian podcasting

IndiCast…India’s first multiperson colloquial podcasts
Podtech launches India centric channel…though its early days for podcasting in India

 Subscribe via RSS

...