Opinion Site Learning

Site was designed to test how television could be used to educate and instruct rural audiences to participate in national development programmes.

The Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (Site) was to be launched with PM Indira Gandhi’s inaugural address beamed off a US satellite. Site would be received in 2,400 villages in six remote clusters in Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Karnataka and Orissa. Site was designed to test how television could be used to educate and instruct rural audiences to participate in national development programmes, and whether it was an easy and effective way to reach far-flung corners, said the report.

Buffer Stocks
Union Finance Minister C. Subramaniam told Parliament that the government was trying to build a buffer stock of at least 12 million tonnes of foodgrains. India needed a buffer stock of 25 million tonnes, he said. Though a good harvest was expected, the nation would have to import at least 12 million tonnes to manage the impact of two successive drought years, he said.

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Peshawar Blasts
Iskandyar Wali Khan, grandson of Frontier Gandhi and son of detained National Awami Party leader Khan Abdul Wali Khan, was sentenced to 10 years rigorous imprisonment by a special (Hyderabad) tribunal at Peshawar that investigated the Peshawar bomb blast case, Radio Pakistan reported. The governor of North-West Frontier Province and a close aide of the then Pakistan Prime Minister Z.A. Bhutto, Hayat Sherpao, was killed in the blast. Islamabad blamed the National Awami Party and banned the organisation.

Gayatri Devi held
The Lok Sabha was informed that Gayatri Devi, a member of the House, had been detained under the Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act. Officials said Devi, the former rajmata of Jaipur, was detained for “activities prejudicial to augmentation of foreign exchange”.