Digital Era Demands Kids And Youth Channels: Experts

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Jul, 2020 ) :It was dire, need of the hour, to start a television channel especially, for children and youth suggested Head of Psychiatry department Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) Professor Dr. Rizwan Taj while talking to APP on Sunday.

Since its beginning television industry kept flourishing but despite the expansion of different networks unfortunately, there was not a single channel dedicated for Children and the youth to teach them how to improve your personal skills and to prove yourself a useful citizen of the society.

If the content aired on that channel would be composed and created while keeping in mind our origin the young soul would definitely, have the opportunity to learn true customs, tradition, norms, standards and values, he stated.

Being in teen years, when everyone looked energetic and demanded challenging and goal oriented game shows or dramas with refined language, he opined.

The channel should cater the needs of children and youth while keeping in mind their different age groups, from toddlers to playgroup pupils needed different programs while children from 5 to 10 years of age required altogether different segments, he mentioned.

Another senior child psychiatrist Dr.Amir said he had seen many cases in which young minds had picked eccentric behavior after watching meaningless stunts of supernatural heroes in cartoons, parents found that uncanny and took children to fake conjuror.

''Channels should focus on teaching children sympathy, harmony, humanity and modesty by showing decent content,'' he suggested Similarly, a seasoned and senior educationist Ahmed Ali said it was a serious and necessary task as children of current age had quite less outdoor recreational places to spend quality time.

A channel fully dedicated for the children would definitely divert their attention from small internet gadgets and other technology based games, he added.

As population increased the skyscraper buildings replaced playgrounds and number of parks were turned into giant shopping malls, he said.

The generations of 90's and post 21st century were quite fortunate as they had more parks and playgrounds to get busy in different sports unlike modern generation, he mentioned.

It would be a novel step to dedicate a channel for youth as they would be the ones to transfer heritage to coming generations, moreover It needs immense and constant efforts to create high quality content, purpose of programs and transmission should be based upon educating children in a fun way, he emphasized.

Principal of Islamabad College for Boys Ali Ahmed Kharal said the internet and smart technology was time savvy indeed but it has worsened the behavior of children as by staying indoor parents are compelled to provide mobile phones to children.

Even a three year old child could play game on a smart phone, while teenagers could see anything on YouTube, it doubled the worries of parents to divert the children interest towards positive elements as they had no choice, nowadays, he added.

No government in past did anything in this context rather number of channels for adults had been launched, art activities such as theater, poetry and other extracurricular events were rarely organized for young generation, moreover fine literature for children was not written in abundance both in urdu and English and available books were beyond their reach due to high prices, he lamented.

Ayesha Riaz, a senior lecturer said while endorsing the statements of other experts that state television channel for kids and youth was essential to introduce our new generation to our national and regional heroes, to educate them about religious values and sacrifices of Islamic heroes.

''My own niece knows everything about European heroes and Indian gods as most of the time she watches channels or programs which are the product of foreign media,every child would know who had founded America but very few would explain who was Muhammad Bin Qasim, she said.

Hania, a student of grade 9th said,she liked to watch television channels but hardly found anything of her interest so she spent her free time on playing online games.

"We want to draw the attention of concerned authorities to launch youth channel with creative and quality programs over history, science, literature," Faiza Abbas another student demanded.