BOB GARFIELD: Radio and TV networks suffer from similar pressures, but for the first time in Pakistan's history, the broadcast media are breaking loose of the government's shackles. Last year, the state reformed its electronic media laws, allowing several private channels to hit the airwaves. Miranda Kennedy reports. [SFX BOY RECITING KORAN UP & UNDER]

MIRANDA KENNEDY: In a country where the teachings of the Koran are primary, the media have often been subservient. When Pakistan was founded in 1947, the right to information was not enshrined in the constitution. Now, Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf walks a fine line to balance the demands of religious conservatives with the powerful military establishment and with new pressure from the U.S. to democratize. [SFX PTV JINGLE MUSIC]

ANNOUNCER: PTV National.

ANNOUNCER: [...?...] Channel.

MIRANDA KENNEDY:Nothing better demonstrates the conflicting forces pulling at Pakistan than its state media. The government -- that is, whichever government is in power -- controls an official news agency -- the all-pervasive Radio Pakistan Network -- and a state TV network --PTV. [CROSSFADE SFX PTV PROGRAMMING]

MIRANDA KENNEDY: Aside from the regime it supports, not much has changed on PTV in its 40 years of existence. The network's four channels are notable for their dry, propagandist tone, decked out with '60s-style sets and graphics. Still, PTV is watched by most of Pakistan, because it is accessible and free. State radio is even less cutting edge than PTV, and its content is screened by the same watchful state eye. Masror Hussain is an anchor at Radio Pakistan, and he says his work is strictly monitored by a rather Orwellian trinity.

MASROR HUSSAIN:What happens is that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Information, and the intelligence agencies -- they send their directives to a consultant who works with Radio Pakistan. And the consultant then holds a meeting with the producer, and they give the line of questioning to the producer, and the producer asks me to put that into a, a journalistic form.

MIRANDA KENNEDY: State media can be very useful in the concentration of official power. When there was a government coup in 1999 and General Musharraf, the incoming president, didn't want the public to know, then they simply did not know. While BBC and CNN broadcast news of a military takeover in Pakistan, PTV played pre-recorded family dramas until Musharraf made an announcement on PTV several hours later.

IMRAN ASLAM: There was a complete blackout, because there was no alternative media out here.

MIRANDA KENNEDY: Imran Aslam is president of GEO TV, Pakistan's leading private TV news station, which was launched only last year. He often wonders what Musharraf's government might do to the media if there were another national emergency.

IMRAN ASLAM:We, as well, are dependent upon cable network. I don't know what they would do in a situation like this -- whether they would, you know, immediately put everything off the air, thereby forcing us to go off too, but certainly if something like that happened, we would scramble, and we would try to get the news out. And I think that the governments have also begun to realize it's very difficult to keep anything like this out. It will filter through.

MIRANDA KENNEDY: Pakistan has allowed private domestic TV news channels into the market, but they are still very carefully controlled. GEO cannot uplink from Pakistani soil, so it has to employ a team in Dubai to receive news from Pakistan and send the content out to the satellite and beam it back to Pakistan. This setup completely cripples live coverage. Nevertheless, GEO and other private channels have brought change to Pakistani TV news. Again, Imran Aslam.

IMRAN ASLAM:We made an impact because of the fact that we were focusing on news, which was a rare commodity in Pakistan prior to the arrival of GEO because it was all state-controlled. The word on the street was "on PTV, seeing is not believing." I, I don't think people accepted everything they were watching on PTV as the truth. They realized it was contaminated by government propaganda. So there was a need, obviously, for, for something that people could start believing in.

MIRANDA KENNEDY: Radio has followed fast behind TV. The government just issued licenses for some 30 privately-owned FM radio stations. But there's a limit. The stations are barred from airing news or public affairs programming that is not produced by the state. For government-employed journalists who can broadcast the news, the private stations present another challenge. Seema Siddiqui is a program director at Radio Pakistan in Islamabad.

SEEMA SIDDIQUI:The electronic media has always been government owned. We were not in competition with anybody, previously. Now, to keep our listeners and to keep our viewers and to keep our audience, we need to be more open. People have a broader canvas of judging for themselves what is true and what is untrue. So you have to cater to that if you want to stay in the race.

MIRANDA KENNEDY: State-employed journalists admit that their viewer- and listenership have taken a beating, simply because Pakistanis now have so many channels to choose from. Successful TV stations like GEO also boast of their strong political impact. Before privatization, broadcast media seldom aired the views of the opposition. Now, GEO not only airs political counterpoints but has a show satirizing General Musharraf in which a look-alike struts around the set, shouting at army officers to pay attention to him. [SFX GEO SHOW/AUDIENCE LAUGHTER] Musharraf may not like the show, but producers proudly scoff that there's nothing he can do about it. [SFX GEO SHOW/AUDIENCE LAUGHTER] For a country that once flogged and jailed journalists who published comments critical of the establishment, that's a great leap forward. For On the Media, I'm Miranda Kennedy in Islamabad. [MUSIC]

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