ITV

Category: Regulators

  • Trai issues paper on cable tariffs for commercial purposes

    Trai issues paper on cable tariffs for commercial purposes

    NEW DELHI: In a bid to bring about a semblance of difference between cable TV pricing for commercial purpose (like in Hotels) and home subscribers, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) today issued a consultation paper to discuss the issue before finalizing some recommendations.

    The Trai paper on commercial tariff seeks to discuss issues like whether there is a need to fix tariffs for commercial purposes and its methodology, definitions of commercial consumers and how they can be differentiated from non-commercial consumers.

    A tariff order of 1 October 2004 did not distinguish between commercial and other services.
    However, while dealing with a batch of petitions filed by the hotel and restaurant industry, the TDSAT (disputes tribunal) in its judgment of 17 January, 2006 had pointed out that the regulator’s earlier order did not cover commercial services.

    Accordingly, after careful examination Trai decided as an interim measure to amend the tariff order and provide for a ceiling for commercial tariff also.

    The present consultation paper is part of an exercise to discuss the issue in detail with broadcast industry stakeholders and those representing the hotels and restaurants.

  • Allow news on private FM: international radio broadcasters association

    Allow news on private FM: international radio broadcasters association

    NEW DELHI: Madrid-based Association International De RadioDifusion (AIR) and International Association of Broadcasting (IAB) have written to the Indian government exhorting green signal to news on private radio FM stations here.

    In a letter dispatched today to the information and broadcasting ministry in Delhi, the international association of private radio broadcasters, including FM, has also attached supportive documents on the regulatory environment from all across the globe where hard core news is allowed on private FM radio stations.

    In India, private FM radio stations are barred from carrying any news and current affairs programming, except information relating to the weather and stock market quotes.

    According to AIR and IAB president Alfonso Ruiz De Assin, “I fail to understand why news is not allowed in India (on private stations) as radio is the fastest medium and extremely user-friendly tool of communication.”

    Early this morning at Madrid (Spain), the general assembly of IAB, in principle, agreed to grant Association of Radio Operators of India (AROI) an active membership. IAB is the global body of private FM Radio broadcasters with more than 17,000 frequencies as members.

    AROI co-coordinator and BAG Infotainment CEO Rajiv Mishra said, “We are glad to get membership of IAB and are hopeful that news will be allowed on private FM radio soon.”

  • MSO’s should be marketing CAS now: Sameer Nair

    MSO’s should be marketing CAS now: Sameer Nair

    MUMBAI: The cable fraternity is wasting the huge first mover advantage they already have in hand vis-a-vis pushing addressability in chasing the mandating of CAS, feels Star Entertainment India CEO Sameer Nair.

    Reiterating Star’s well documented opposition to mandated CAS, Nair asserts that the MSOs are seriously missing a trick on the matter in their “all-consuming” focus on getting a mandate out that will fix a time frame for the rollout of CAS.
    Nair drew attention to the latest reports circulating indicating that it could be anywhere between six to eight months at the minimum for the mandated CAS rollout to take off (if at all).

    According to Nair, even as big corporate players were preparing the ground for different addressable delivery platforms to roll out, the cable fraternity were only focussed on getting a cut-off date in place for the rollout of CAS.

    Nair is of the view that with the imminent arrival of Tata-Sky DTH, Zee’s Dish TV ramping up and the big telecom players aggressively pushing ahead with IPTV, market forces would soon make the whole debate irrelevant and the MSOs may well end up “missing the addressability bus”.

    Nair averred that MSOs should instead be focussing their efforts on attractively packaging and marketing CAS to their direct points to begin with and concurrently convincing their franchisees of the need to get CAS going, government or no government.

    Another issue he raised was on the inability of many cable ops to deliver on CAS even if it was mandated. He said that barring a few big MSOs, most operators were simply not ready for CAS. Neither did they have the set top boxes nor the subscriber management systems in place to get it off the ground.

    According to Nair, in such a scenario, the likely result would be a blackout of pay channels in many areas, as had been witnessed in Chennai. But the difference here, he pointed out, was that unlike in Chennai, where there was no great demand for pay channels, in this case it would more likely be because of inability to deliver.

  • SC ruling gives FM lifeline to Millenium Broadcasting

    SC ruling gives FM lifeline to Millenium Broadcasting

    MUMBAI: There’s hope yet for Millenium Broadcasting, one of the early entrants into the FM scene in Mumbai with its Win 94.6 station, but which has been off air since May 2004.

    The Supreme Court has thrown a lifeline to the Gautam Radia promoted private radio venture in its long drawn battle with the government, initially fought through the Telecom Disputes Settlement Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT).

    The apex court, which heard the case last week, has ruled in Millenium Broadcasting’s favour, concurring with TDSAT’s judgment in the matter. TDSAT had earlier ruled that the government shall not auction the frequency 94.6 MHz and that the company was entitled to broadcast FM radio within the territory of Mumbai.

    In its ruling, TDSAT had also ordered that Millenium Broadcasting was entitled to the benefit of migration from fixed licence fee regime to revenue sharing regime under the second phase of the FM radio policy, which grants this benefit to the existing license holders.

    For the record, the licence of Millenium Broadcast Pvt Ltd was revoked in May 2003 for non-payment of licence fee. Subsequently, in September 2005, the government had invited pre-qualification bids for 338 FM channels in 91 cities across the country, including five FM stations in Mumbai.

    After hearing Millenium Broadcast’s plea in the matter, TDSAT issued an order in October 2005 stating that the frequency shall be excluded from the ambit of the five FM channels in Mumbai that were up for bidding.

  • FM radio ops form panel on music rights, infra issues

    FM radio ops form panel on music rights, infra issues

    NEW DELHI: The FM radio operators of Indian today formed a nine-member committee to look in to various issues related to infrastructure, music royalty and interacting with various organizations like the Broadcast Engineering Society India Ltd and pubcaster Prasar Bharati, which is slated to rent out some of its transmissions towers.

    According to a statement from the Association of Radio Operators of India (AROI), the panel’s mandate is to try negotiating better deals with infrastructure providers and organization that deal in music copyright issues.

    The music royalty issue is a contentious matter with AROI alleging that the Phonographic Performance Ltd (PPL) and another music rights organization have made irrational demands for music rights overlooking the fact that a uniform rights fee could not be applied on small and big radio operators alike.

    PPL is the copyright society in respect of sound recordings and is registered with the government. It is mainly engaged in administering the broadcasting / telecasting and public performance rights on behalf of over 139 music companies that are its members.

    The AROI panel includes BAG Infotainment’s Radio Masti CEO Rajiv Mishra, Radio Mirchi CEO Prashant Panday, Radio Today chief Anil Mehra, Radio City CEO Apoorva Purohit, Syntech Informatics CEO Ashok Narayan, ABP radio CEO Sanjay Prasad and Mathrubhumi Radio chief executive George Sebastian.

    Two positions have been kept vacant for representatives from the Anil
    Ambani-controlled Adlabs Radio and Sun TV.

  • Jaitley issues warning on titillating programming

    Jaitley issues warning on titillating programming

    Indian information and broadcasting minister Arun Jaitley issued a stern warning to TV channels which are banking on nudity and semi-nudity or provocative programming to attract audiences and generate viewership.

    “People have protested about how some organisations are taking advantage of liberal norms in India. Why should you have a stripper in a airconditioner ad which was shown recently on television? Why should a condom commercial be so erotic and put on television for all to see,” he asked. “If fashion is to be marketed in terms of transparent clothing, and every decency violated on TV screens, I don’t know if we can allow that. The cable and satellite industry has to morally police itself. Also advertisers. There are issues which affect our sensibilities. I don’t think Indian society is prepared for this. We want a liberal regime. Hard censorship is abhorrent to any democracy. But if industry is not interested then we may have to step in.”

    Jaitley was speaking while addressing a gathering organised by FICCI on what Indian entertainment should be doing to ensure rapid growth in the new millennium on 30 March.

    Jaitley was pretty caustic about his ministry’s position on this issue. Should the government step in when we have control devices such as child locks, he was asked. Should it not be the responsibility of the parent or adult?

    He responded icicly: “The industry has absolutely no responsibility does it? TV censorship in India is not in the form of pre-censorship. It is like the green channel in the Customs where the onus is on you to declare honestly. But if we allow some channels which are not comlying honestly than five others will get in and take advantage of our liberal attitude. ”

    Going by Jaitley’s statements it is quite likely that the government may shortly come out with a ban against the Michael Adam promoted Fashion Television, which is generating high viewerships in India mainly because of scantily clad models. Jaitley had banned Russian channel TB6 last year because it showed pornographic films and had ordered Indian cable networks to stop carrying it on their networks. Most Indian cable TV operators have complied since.

  • Govt turns down IBF plea on downlink norm

    Govt turns down IBF plea on downlink norm

    NEW DELHI: The Indian government has turned down a request from the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) to extend the 180-day deadline for fulfilling newly-formulated downlinking norms by broadcasting companies.

    In a letter to the information and broadcasting ministry, the IBF, an apex body of TV companies operating in India, had sought two months extension on the deadline since the downlink application form had been put out by the ministry on its website around 25h January 2006.

    The government had given all TV companies a 180-day period from 11 November 2005 (when the guidelines were formulated and announced) to fulfill all conditions listed in the downlink policy to get landing rights in India.

    The Indian government’s downlink policy has been a subject of debate in the broadcast industry with some players and industry bodies like the Hong Kong-based Casbaa terming the conditions harsh that will affect various business models of companies concerned.

    Amongst the many conditions, the most important one being that all TV channels beaming into India will have to register themselves with the government/designated authority and establish a permanent establishment here irrespective of the fact whether they are uplinking from India or outside.

    Establishment of permanent establishment in India is aimed at making TV companies, managing channels uplinked out of India, answerable to Indian laws. This would also result in a higher outflow of money as taxes to be paid in India.

    In the past, there have been instances when the Indian arm of foreign
    broadcasting companies have pleaded before disputes tribunal that they were not governed by Indian laws as they are mere advertising concessionaries undertaking marketing activities.

  • I&B ministry finalizing terms of law on broadcast regulator

    I&B ministry finalizing terms of law on broadcast regulator

    MUMBAI: The terms of reference of a law that will bring about a separate broadcast regulator are almost ready.
    This was revealed to Indiantelevision.com by Information & Broadcasting secretary SK Arora on the sidelines of the convention for the business of entertainment, Ficci Frames, this morning in Mumbai.

    Once the framework of the law is finalized, it would be distributed among the interministerial committee for comments and any possible fine tuning, Arora said,”From here, the document would have to be scrutinized for a final say by the Union cabinet, after which it would then be presented before Parliament.”

    While Arora declined to give a time frame under which this process would move forward, he expressed confidence that from his ministry’s end, the law would be ready “at the soonest”.

    Queried about the role of the current regulator for both the telecom and broadcast sector, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), Arora noted that the challenges for the broadcast industry and telecom are different. First, it is important that convergence is facilitated within the broadcast sector. After that one can look at facilitating convergence between sectors i.e. broadcast and telecom. The regulatory body will work towards ensuring that the fruits of development are not vitiated by adversarial relations. “The aim of regulation is to preserve development. We will also be coming out with a regulation on content code,” he said.

    Ficci is assisting in formulating the draft of the regulation. The Group of Ministers (GoM) who concentrate on the Ice industry will fine-tune it. Then it will be sent to the cabinet. It will be passed when the cabinet approves of it. A further announcement on this regulation is expected in the coming weeks.

    Basically it is aimed at being a self regulatory mechanism. Arora however conceded that regulation always lags behind technological changes. The broadcast industry has been no exception. He also stressed the importance of content providers and creators reaching remote areas of the country. “Whether it is cable, DTH, cinema halls, no villager should be left behind. If we work on this, then the potential will be double than what has already been achieved.”

    Arora also highlighted the concern of piracy. He said that the government has been working with Ficci on the Optical Disc Law and this work will continue in the months ahead. “The reason why we approach the industry is that we want to have a regulatory framework that helps the industry move forward.”

    “Another important area that is growing is animation and gaming. We need investment from foreign players and leaders in this area. The challenge for us is to attract foreign firms in this area. At this time, there are foreign firms coming into India while Indian firms travel abroad. Foreign firms bring their brand in. However, Indian firms when they go abroad do so under an international brand. The exception is the Indian film industry and for this I want to congratulate them,” said Arora.

  • Trai’s Baijal ends tenure; Misra likely successor

    Trai’s Baijal ends tenure; Misra likely successor

    NEW DELHI: Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) chairman Pradip Baijal retired today from service after an eventful three-year tenure as the chief regulator and a civil services career spanning 40 years.

    During his tenure as the Trai chief, Baijal has been instrumental in bringing various telecom services within the reach of ordinary people as prices fell and tele-density increased.
    Under him, Trai also stood its ground in guarding the price line of cable TV services and did away with premiums to be paid on exclusive content much to the chagrin of pay broadcasters.

    On his last day today, Baijal is said to have told a close associate that he’s going away with a sense of pride for having stood up for consumers’ rights about which much still needs to be done.

    Baijal is likely to be succeeded by former telecommunications secretary Nripendra Misra, who presently heads a Centre for Department of Telematics-Alacatel joint venture as its chairman.

    Misra, according to telecom ministry sources, is the front-runner for the top post at Trai, though last-minute calisthenics could see a surprise candidate being sprung on the telecom and broadcast industries, which are going through changing times and grappling with introduction of new norms and technologies.

    Baijal, a 1966 Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the Madhya Pradesh cadre, was a hand-on person taking personal interest in important issues like changes to the access deficit charge (ADC) that punctured mobile phone bills and proposing a comprehensive rollout plan for the vexed issue of CAS, which, however, is gathering dust at the I&B ministry.

    “Mr. Baijal was a result driven person, taking personal interest in key issues regarding the industry,” an associates of Baijal at Trai told Indiantelevision.com.

    In fact, it was Baijal who is credited with suggesting a reduction in ADC, a fee that private telecom operators pay to the state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd and its eventual withdrawal by 2009.

    Even towards the end of his inning at Trai, Baijal continued to aggressively support and push for unified licensing under which a licencee can offer telecom, infotech and broadcasting services on a single licence.

    The new chairman’s name is yet to be notified by the government and could take some days. In the interim, the senior-most member-secretary could function as the head of Trai.

    Former secretary of the department of telecom (DoT) Misra is said to be front runner for the top Trai post. The name of GD Gaiha, chairman of Telecommunications Consultant of India LTD (TCIL) is doing the rounds of the media to replace Dr DPS. Seth as a member.

    In recent times, Baijal’s stature had risen so much that its parent, the telecom ministry, had started feeling uncomfortable. The government is likely to get a low profile person as Trai chairman to avoid run-ins with the telecom minister.

    Misra, a 1967 IAS officer, had worked closely with the present communications and IT minister Dayanidhi Maran whose elder brother and family control the South Indian media power house Sun TV group.

  • SC grants interim stay in Fame Adlabs entertainment tax issue

    SC grants interim stay in Fame Adlabs entertainment tax issue

    MUMBAI: The Supreme Court has granted an interim stay in the case pertaining to past entertainment tax dues on Fame Adlabs, which is owned by Swanston Multiplex Cinemas Pvt.Ltd.

    Admitting the plea filed by Swanston against an interim order by Mumbai High Court in the case of collection of entertainment tax the Supreme Court bench comprising Arijit Pasayat and SH Kapadia passed the stay order.

    In February 2006, the Mumbai High Court had passed an interim order directing Swanston to deposit Rs 19.8 million of entertainment tax.

    Challenging the High Court’s order Swanston today pleaded that it had not violated any norms pertaining to entertainment tax exemptions.