Telecom Lead Asia: Indian broadcasting industry is bleeding due to several policy issues.
Minister of Information and Broadcasting Manish Tewari does not have enough convincing answers to queries posed by several stakeholders during an interaction organized by CII on Thursday.
In several occasions, answers of the I&B minister, who took charge four months back, were not satisfactory to complaints from policy makers from DTH players, LCOs, MSOs and TV channels.
However, as a young minister, he promised action – may not be solutions — to all problems faced by the Indian broadcasting industry.
At some point of time, the I&B minister said the ministry does not have a magic wand and hence there will be no immediate solution. “We need to sit together (with TRAI) and discuss,” Tewari said.
Indian broadcasting industry’ burning issues
KVL Narayan Rao, executive vice chairperson, NDTV, says the upcoming guidelines on 12-minute advts in an hour will bleed the industry. “We would like to generate more revenue (at least 70 percent) from subscription like in the U.S. But we currently rely on advts. Curbs on advts slots will be a hurdle to stay in the business,” he added.
According to COFI president Roop Sharma, second round of digitization, which was done without much planning, has created inconvenience to LCOs. The following are COFI’s main issues
1) There are poor quality STBs in the market which are offered by LCOs to cable consumers without warranty.
2) There are litigations and complaints by LCOs. I&B is yet to take up the matter.
3) Lack of portability for STBs in a couple of cities. Consumers are not happy with the situation.
4) Revenue sharing issue is yet to be taken up.
According to Hemant Upadhyay, who spoke about poor quality services to consumers, said LCOs are not offering maintenance or good quality services to cable consumers. The following are consumer issues:
1) Price of STBs are determined by LCOs. There’s less transparency in pricing.
2) Channel prices have gone up.
3) There’s no proper billing or maintenance from LCOs.
4) Consumers are not interested in buying STBs which are coming with high prices.
5) Advertisements should be reduced.
SN Sharma, CEO of DEN Networks, says the industry is offering STBs with guarantee / warrantee. “We have already invested around Rs 3,000 crore for digitization. Cable Act needs to be changed in the wake of new technologies and new players in the market,” he added.
Ankur Jain, managing director of JAINHITS, wants the I&B minister to allow mortgage of broadcasting license so that banks will fund them without troubles.
Promises from I&B Minister Manish Tewari
1) There will be discussion with TRAI to solve 12 minute advt. issue.
2) There will be more discussion on idea of techno-commercial regulator for the broadcast sector which is witnessing rapid changes in the wake of cable TV digitization.
3) Content will not be regulated by the Government.
4) There will be trouble free digitization in next phase.
5) He has expressed concern on TAM TRP data and said that Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) should be created at the earliest.
6) The Government will continue to favor domestic manufacturing and deployment of set-top box and may also consider fixing certain percentage (for domestic manufacturers) for reaching out to the next 50 million consumers in the subsequent phases of digitization.
The I&B stakeholders should not face problems that affect the telecom industry in India. Broadcasting is evolving. It needs more support from the government and the minister.
