NEW DELHI: Among a plethora of activities and events being held to commemorate 75 years of India’s independence, a podcast series on ‘unsung’ heroes of the country’s freedom struggle — ‘Bharat Ki Kahani Meenakshi Lekhi Ki Zubani’ (Story of India by Meenakshi Lekhi) — stands out. This is arguably the only programme which has direct involvement or participation of a Union minister under Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav (AKAM) initiative in the true sense.
Not only Lekhi, the minister of state for external affairs and culture records podcasts in her voice, but she also picks a freedom fighter, whose story is to be told, does research and prepares scripts. In this endeavour, she is supported by an all-women team comprising her personal staff and friends.
The average duration of the podcast is about eight minutes and a new episode is released on the AKAM portal every day and simultaneously promoted on various social media platforms. Lekhi conceived and planned the series herself as part of the 75-day countdown to the 75th Independence Day celebration launched in March. The idea was to tell motivational stories of lesser-known individuals, who also had made sacrifices along with the big leaders for freedom, to the younger generation in the easiest form of storytelling.
“The government had already published a storybook on 25 unsung heroes. We wanted to document other motivation stories as well. I was brainstorming with my staff about how these stories could be passed on to the next generation. One suggestion was that they can be included in the school syllabus but that is a long process. Then, we finally decided to launch the podcast series,” Lekhi said. which is a handy and easy way of story narration,” said Lekhi.
Her staff, who had already heard Lekhi on the radio, suggested she record the podcast herself. Lekhi’s small room office at her official residence on Mahadev Road turns into a recording studio on weekends or on working days, where podcasts are recorded. So far, the minister has already completed 70 episodes.
“As people in my office insisted, I agreed to don the hat of a podcaster. My past experience of working with All India Radio (AIR) during college days came in handy,” added Lekhi. The team selects each story cautiously and verifies its authenticity. It checks historical references, books, and web portals before scripting. Presently broadcast is in English but soon, the Hindi version will also be launched.