Essay, Paragraph or Speech on “Television and Education” Complete Essay, Speech for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Television and Education

Television is one of the most wonderful achievements of science. It represents an advanced technological marvel of the present age. Its vast potentialities as a powerful medium of mass communication cannot be under-estimated. It is, indeed, the last word in entertainment and enlightenment. It can enlighten our illiterate and ignorant masses—women in the rural areas in particular—and widen their mental horizon. It can help them overcome the narrowing influence of regionalism, casteism, racism and thus promote national integration. Programmes on subjects like health and hygiene, family planning and nutrition will be of immense help to them. In short, in recent times the television has become one of the most important means of recreation and propaganda.

Since ours is an agricultural economy, priority should be given to educate the ill-informed farmers. Our actual agricultural productivity being much below the potential productivity of the land, the television can play a very significant role in enlightening the farmers about the latest technical devices of agriculture, the utility of various kinds of fertilizers and pesticides or any other modern methods of rejuvenating the agricultural activity in general. In addition to giving the villagers professional guidance the television can present to them a whole variety of cultural patterns, thus doing away with their isolation and modernize their thinking.

Another objective should be the promotion of national integration. Indian culture comprehends in itself such an odd assortment of customs and ceremonies that unless concrete steps are taken to educate the people in the cultural heritage of other States, the ideal of national integration is difficult to be realized. But through carefully planned television programmers, it should be possible to emphasis the basic cultural unity of India and to bind 900 million Indians in an indissoluble relationship.

Next priority should be given to family planning. We should use the television to extend the message to millions of villagers who still seem to be labouring under the misunderstanding that a large family is their destiny that cannot be interfered with. Besides, they are ignorant of the substantial benefits that accrue from a small family. Since sex is a great taboo in our Indian society, the programmes relating to family planning have to be suggestive and their message implied rather than explicitly stated.

The medium of audio-visual communication has a very powerful appeal. It can, therefore, be very gainfully utilized for the purpose of education. Lessons on science, mathematics, geography and other disciplines should be shown. Interesting films educating the students in traffic rules, rules of health and hygiene, law and order problems, etc., should be telecast. There are several other subjects and topics such as working of democracy in our country, functioning of the parliamentary system in India, progress. of huge projects undertaken by the Government, which may also be shown to the people on TV. Advertisements are bad because their influence on children is unhealthy. On the one hand, these advertisements are designed to persuade people to buy the things, mostly luxury items, while on the other hand, these encourage people to spend money needlessly.

There are some people who consider TV a luxury for a poor country like India where about 30 per cent of the people are still living below the poverty line. TV caters to the amusement of a small section of city dwellers. The villagers, the people in small towns and the poor people in cities are unable to benefit by it. Therefore, the Government should take every step to provide television sets within the reach of common man so that everyone is benefited by it.