The recently released draft recommendations on provision of IPTV services by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) allows licensed telecom companies, internet service providers (ISPs) with a net worth of more than Rs 1 billion and registered cable TV operators to provide IPTV services without the issue of fresh licences. Further, TRAI has said that any breach of the act or licence by telecom service providers or cable operators would be dealt with by designated agencies.
IPTV delivers television programmes using an IP network and high speed broadband connectivity. With IPTV fast becoming a popular value-added service in many countries, the issue of who can offer IPTV services has been a concern for a while.According to TRAI, while the unified access service licence (UASL) and the cellular mobile telephony service (CMTS) licence permit triple play, and the ISP licence too now allows provision of IPTV services, it really was a question of cable TV operators being allowed to do the same.
After deliberating on the matter at length, TRAI offered its recommendations, which, apart from the licensing norms, include:
Content regulation
Licensees, while providing TV channels through IPTV, must transmit only such channels in exactly the same (unaltered) form for which the broadcasters received uplinking/downlinking permission from the government (Ministry of Information and Broadcasting). In such cases, the responsibility of ensuring that the content complies with existing laws, rules and regulations would be that of the broadcaster and the telecom licensee will not be held responsible.
In the case of content other than TV channels from broadcasters, the telecom licensee will be responsible for observing the programme and advertisement codes.Such programme and advertisement codes will be the same as those provided in the Cable Television Network (Regulation) Act, 1995 and its rules.
The I&B ministry as well as the telecom and IT ministry will monitor the programme content. It would therefore be appropriate that the respective ministries regulate the content provided through IPTV. Operational procedures such as keeping a copy of the content shown through IPTV, monitoring requirements, etc. can be worked out by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) based on feedback from the respective ministries.Any violation of the prevailing acts, rules or guidelines relating to content by telecom service providers in provisioning of IPTV services will be reported to DoT by the respective ministries. The decision of the respective ministries regarding violation will be final. DoT can thereafter ascertain the penalties for the breach in a timebound manner to maintain uniformity.
Telecom service providers offering IPTV services will show only those news channels that have been approved by the I&B ministry.
Downlinking policy
The uplinking/downlinking guidelines should be amended to enable the broadcasters to provide signals to all distributors of TV channels such as cable operators, multi-system operators, DTH operators, HITS (head-end in the sky) operators and IPTV service providers.
TRAI has invited feedback from the stakeholders by the end of the year. It will issue its final recommendations to the government thereafter.
