Sub-titles in Doordarshan

The Hindu : Metro Plus Chennai / Miscellany : Easy read: "Same Language Subtitling (SLS) is a fun reading practice that not only helps early-literates and school dropouts, but also according to Brij, 'doubles and even triples the rate of reading improvement that children may be achieving through formal education.'

SLS was tested at villages and railway stations before it was beamed nationwide through the popular programme, Chitrahaar. It was a sure fire hit � if you knew how to read you could learn the lyrics, if you were in a noisy little caf� or hard of hearing, you `heard' the songs better. Surveys conducted by Nielsen's ORG-Centre for Social Research, around 90 per cent viewers preferred songs with SLS.

Plus, it's cheap: one paisa for a year's reading practice per person. 'Simply because with every nationally telecast TV programme, we reach over 100 million early-literate people,' says Brij.

According to Brij, Doordarshan is 'on the verge of implementing SLS nationally on all TV programmes and languages. The CEO of Prasar Bharati, K. S. Sarma, the Director General of Doordarshan, Navin Kumar, and the Secretary of Education, Kumud Bansal, are all leading the way in recognising that SLS could do wonders for literacy in India,' says Brij."