DoT to supervise IPTV services: Trai

Ignoring the demand of the cable industry that new media platform IPTV be governed by the Cable TV Act, 1995, with the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) acting as the nodal body, telecom regulator Trai today hinted that the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) would be the nodal agency for these services.

The rules for the operational procedures would be made by the DoT, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) said.

This gains importance as currently all services involving transmission of television channels over any platform are governed by the I&B ministry.

Trai, in its provision paper on Internet Protocol (IP) TV (television that uses IP network and high-speed broadband connections), has said that the DoT will look into matters pertaining to IPTV in consultation with other ministries concerned.

"Operational procedures like time to keep a copy of the contents shown on IPTV, monitoring requirements etc can be worked out by the DoT based on feedback from the respective ministries," Trai said in its paper.

"The DoT may perhaps seek the guidance of the respective ministries to ascertain the penalties for the breach to maintain uniformity and shall initiate suitable action for imposing penalties for violations in a time-bound manner," the Trai paper said.

On licensing issues, Trai said the telecom companies having Unified Access Service Licence and cable companies registered under the Cable TV Act would not require any fresh licence. Trai has also allowed Internet Service Providers (ISPs) having a net worth of Rs 100 crore to start these services.

IPTV is a way of delivering and viewing TV programmes using an Internet Protocol network and high-speed broadband. IPTV is interactive because of availability of return path (consumers can interact by asking for offerings), which is not in the case with cable services.

Therefore, IPTV is also capable of providing video-on-demand, time-shifted television (a show that can be watched days after being telecast) and other exciting features. However, ignoring the arguments of the broadcasters and the cable industry, Trai has termed IPTV as a delivery platform and not a "service."

It has suggested that uplinking and downlinking guidelines should be amended to enable broadcasters to provide signals to all distributors of TV channels such as cable operators, MSOs, DTH operators, HITS operators and IPTV service providers.