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According to ASSOCHAM, the entertainment industry in India is said to be around Rs 35,000 crore currently and is growing at 19% per annum. By 2010, it is expected to be around Rs 85,000 crore.

The stakeholders however, see the industry as worth much more. The immense reach and influence of television has been a constant source of concern and encouragement, for the various stakeholders in the broadcast/entertainment industry. The stakeholders are many, and they are an increasing tribe-from politicians, government bureaucrats and officials of the industry, social workers, broadcasters, advertisers, viewers, and the cable network operators. As newer media and entertainment venues open, many more will rise to claim a stake in this growing industry.

In the beginning there were only Doordarshan, All India Radio, and the Indian film industry. (Amitabh Bacchhan has famously expressed his reservations with the term Bollywood, and Bacchhan's knowledge of Indian cinema is considered by many to be better than that of the Oxford English Dictionary.)

After years of tranquility in the Indian broadcast scenario, came the Iraqi invasion of 1991, and with it the Indian masses woke up to the reality and the possibility of receiving something other than Doordarshan on their television screens.

But there was no clamoring among the masses to watch the video games shown by CNN. Then, in 1993 came a cataclysmic event-the Hero Cup. The BCCI and the Cricket Association of Bengal decided to make some money from these matches and, in the process, prevented Doordarshan from claiming its till-now fundamental right to telecast these matches, for little or no monetary consideration. Doordarshan had claimed that its benevolent act of broadcasting a cricket match was in the national interest.

The courts have since decided on the issue. The broadcaster's use of the airwaves can no longer be allowed to go on unregulated, and ever since, the government has been coming out with one attempt or another to put a comprehensive broadcasting regulation in place, with little or no success.

Nobody should doubt the need for regulation. Even the harshest critics of regulation will agree that regulations double up to provide the industry protection from an arbitrary government. And in any case, it is the duty of any sovereign government to regulate, and it cannot let the 200 different channels to come out with disparate (even if well intended) codes for their programming.

A Good Beginning or too Late?
It is interesting to note that broadcasting has been around for a much longer time than the cable television networks. But the Cable TV Act has been around for about a decade now, and there are no signs that a comprehensive act regulating the broadcasting industry is on the horizon.

SK Arora, secretary, ministry of information and broadcasting, says that the current draft of the Broadcasting Bill is the 19th, and he adds that this is neither the beginning nor the end of the process, but the process is in the middle.

However, with the march of technology and the growing adoption of digital broadcast technologies (IPTV and mobile TV to name a few), the broadcasting bill could soon become redundant, at best. The worst-case scenario would be that this law would extend to the new, digital broadcast technologies and the story of the Telegraph Act holding sway over the modern broadcast industry could end up being repeated all over again.

Therefore, before discussing what the bill contains, it may help to point a few things that it does not. The bill deliberately steers clear of technologies like IPTV, mobile TV, and any Internet-based broadcasting. The secretary assures us that this is deliberate, because it would be a good idea to see how the industry grows, and then look at what needs to be regulated and how. However, it is a process that has to be expedited as broadcasting increasingly touches the IT Act, Copyright Act etc, and if these acts are not rationalized with a broadcasting code now, harmonizing them at a later date would be increasingly difficult.

The simple reason for this disconnect appears to be that broadcasting today involves at least the following: the IT ministry, the communications ministry, I&B ministry, and TRAI. Barring Pradip Baijal's parting gift (to be fair, among the many parting gifts) in the form of Recommendations on Issues relating to Convergence and Competition in Broadcasting and Telecommunications; and the I&B ministry's lead (albeit crippled for lack of enthusiasm in the other ministries), the others have put broadcasting on the back burner. Even the TRAI; Ashok Mansukhani, president, MSO Alliance, is constantly washing its hands off on many of the issues that are brought to it, restricting its regulatory activities to cable TV only.

The bill also excludes making guidelines for broadcast content, except in broadest terms. However, it clarifies that a content code will have to be arrived at.

And notably, it exempts public broadcasters from certain provisions that the other broadcasters see as unfair. The foul is being called because the public broadcasters are conveniently understood to Doordarshan and All India Radio. KVL Narayan Rao, director, NDTV, raises a valid point on defining the public service broadcaster. Since Doordarshan does commercial programming also, and the news channels cover a lot of issues that are in the public interest-should all news channels be given the benefits of public service broadcasters?

The Bill of Fair
The bill is not a lengthy piece of document, so we discuss only the contentions aspects, the ones that have the industry up in arms (even if in disparate voices).

BRAI: To begin with, there is a proposed Broadcasting Regulatory Authority of India, and its very nature and composition is already under attack. Its funding is supposed to be through grants-in-aid from the government, while the licensing money, it will collect will go to the Consolidated Fund of India.

As the secretary puts it plainly, the industry has come to be regulated through various guidelines and regulations for cable operators and MSOs etc and these are already being enforced by the government. So, most of what the bill proposes to dispose though a broadcasting regulator is already being done.

CATV Vindicated: But, rather than being a consolation, this is exactly what is sending shivers down the industry's spine. The bill proposes to replace the Cable Televison Network (Regulation) Act, and the experience with the Cable TV Act has not been encouraging. In fact, so harried have cable operators been with this Act, that they are viewing the proposed bill as being too soft, compared to the Cable TV Act. Roop Sharma, president, Cable Operator's Federation of India demands that the relatively soft 'bill' replace the Cable TV Act immediately, even as the broadcasting industry is crying hoarse that the proposed bill is a draconian piece of regulation. The powers of the seizure and confiscation are a case in point, wherein any authorized officer can seize the broadcaster's equipment on the suspicion that the broadcast is unlicensed, or if directions of the Central government (issued in public interest) are not carried out. CATV has almost resigned to this interference as being a part of its business. Sharma even alleges that the bill is not being brought in to correct the inadequacies of the Cable Act, but for the benefits of broadcasters. Why else, she argues, is the bill so repugnant to broadcasters even though they saw it fit enough for CATV operators for over a decade now? In fact, her association welcomes the bill, for it will end the discrimination between broadcasters and CATV operators.

The need is for a balance and the freedom of smaller and local broadcasters needs to be preserved. Whether it has to be done by restraining the big player, is open to debate

Like the CATV operators then, the bill proposes that all broadcasters will have to obtain a licence. This licence cannot be obtained as a matter of right and can be revoked for reason such as: the content being broadcasted does not conform to the content code, or is not in the national interest. And since there is no code yet, the program and advertising code of the Cable Act is proposed to be continued.

Is this Cricket?: For historical reasons perhaps, the bill mandates the sharing of 'certain sports broadcast signals'. The government will have the right to declare certain sporting events (national and international) as events of national importance and licensed broadcasters will have to simultaneously share the live feed and radio commentary with DD and AIR-without the advertisements.

Cross-media Ownership: Another contentious issue is of cross-media ownership. The bill proposes that the government should actively prevent monopolies across different media segments as well as within the segments. It prevents content broadcasters from having more than 20% share in the broadcast network operators, and vice versa. The icing to the anti-monopoly stance of the bill is that there will be prescribed ceiling on the number of channels that a content broadcaster can have. If this provision is allowed, it is argued (as always), that the investment in broadcasting will decline, especially as these investments have a very long gestation period. In support of this provision, Sharmila Tagore, chairman, Central Board of Film Certification, cites numerous examples where viewers have lost real choice as almost all the channels are showing similar content. She says the primary objective of media regulation in a democracy is to preserve and protect the citizen's fundamental right to information and freedom of expression.

She quotes, “In many cases, not only is the content globalized, but also the intent to shape local opinion to external agenda.” However, the question to ask here is: Is it necessary (or even feasible) that global giants would be countered by numerous small players? The counterpoint of course is that all monopolies behave similarly in an open market. Obviously, the need is for a balance and the freedom of smaller and local broadcasters needs to be preserved. Whether it has to be done by restraining the big player, is open to debate.

The other problem with this ceiling on cross-media holdings is that by the time this bill is enacted as a law, a lot of cross-holding patterns may have emerged. Will the bill then have to make provision for forced divestment from existing businesses? It is noteworthy that players like Zee, owner of Siticable, are seeking 3G spectrum. And, how will it accommodate issues like triple play and quad play, with even the Cable TV Operators of India eyeing 3G spectrum for providing mobile TV and broadband.

Can Yan Cook?: Remember the 'Yan Can Cook' shows in the early days of STAR TV? And the early Sony TV programming? Well, foreign channels would no longer be able to dump programs to the Indian audience. Content produced in India must be 15% of their weekly programming. While that is laudable, certain issues will need more discussion. How will the channels, PTV or Nepal TV cope with this stipulation, or is it that these channels will not be considered for licensing? The 'As seen on TV' type of programs are already making their way to otherwise serious channels. Will these programs count as 'local'?

You Live to Serve: The bill also proposes that 10% of programming and commercial time will be for public service programming, as specified by the government. The most disturbing thing here is that this programming will not be dictated by the BRAI, but by the government. While in the hands of anybody, such power is prone to abuse, in the hands of a political party in power, it is sure to be abused, as in the India Shining campaign. At least in the hands of the regulator, there would be a semblance of objectivity in deciding such public service broadcasting regulations.

Alok Singh
aloksi@cybermedia.co.in