Govt stiffens entry norms for new TV channels

NEW DELHI: The Indian government is making it tougher for those who have dodgy backgrounds to launch new channels, particularly in the news genre. While there is no cap on the number of television channels in the country, the net worth norms have been stiffened.

For news and current affairs channels, the net worth criteria has been revised upwards, climbing almost seven times from Rs 30 million to Rs 200 million for the first channel and Rs 50 million for each additional channel.

Clearly, the government has been influenced by a wide array of channel launches from promoters who are not serious about the news business but have got in because of dubious reasons.

In the case of the general entertainment channels and downlinking of foreign channels, the net worth criteria has been revised from Rs 15 million to Rs 50 million for the first channel and Rs 25 million for each additional channel.

The period of permission/registration for uplinking/downlinking of channels will be uniform at 10 years. Renewal of the ermissions of TV channels will be considered for a period of 10 years at a time, subject to the condition that the channel should not have been found guilty of violating the terms and conditions of permission including violations of the Programme and Advertisement Code on five occasions or more.

This follows a decision of the Union Cabinet to recast the existing "Policy Guidelines for Uplinking and Downlinking of TV channels". The Information and Broadcasting Ministry has also made various amendments in the existing policy to reflect the fast evolving electronic media landscape in the country.

The changes come about 15 months after the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) made its recommendations, since the Ministry had felt those recommendations were too steep and sent its own views to the regulator for taking a final view.

The amendments envisage significant changes in the eligibility criteria of companies seeking to operate TV channels in India in order to ensure that only serious and credible operators are permitted to operate such channels and the electronic media landscape is not unnecessarily crowded by non-serious players.
 
Permission had been granted by 31 August this year to 745 private satellite TV channels, out of which 366 TV channels were permitted in the category of ‘News and Current Affairs‘ and 379 in the category of ‘Non-News and Current Affairs‘.

The net worth criteria for teleports would be uniform irrespective of channel capacity. The net worth criteria would remain Rs 30 million for the first teleport and Rs 10 million for every additional teleport.

All TV channels would be required to operationalise their TV channels within a time frame of one year from the date of permission, for which Non-News and current affairs channels will have to sign a Performance Bank Guarantee (PBG) of Rs.10 million whereas News and Current Affairs channels will have to give a Performance Bank Guarantee for Rs. 20 million. In the event of non-operationalisation of the permitted channel within a period of one year, the PBG will be forfeited and permission cancelled.

One of the persons occupying the top management position - Chairperson or Managing Director or Chief Executive Officer or Chief Operating Officer or Chief Technical Officer or Chief Financial Office in the applicant company - should have a minimum of three years of prior experience in a media company, for both News and Non-News channels.

Proposals of merger, de-merger and amalgamation will be allowed under the provisions of Companies Act, after obtaining the permissions of the Information and Broadcasting Ministry.

Channels operating in India and uplinked from India but meant only for foreign viewership should be required to ensure compliance of the rules and regulations of the target country for which content is being produced and uplinked.

Permission fee for uplinking/downlinking of TV channels and setting up of teleports would be Rs 200,000 per channel/teleport per annum. Permission fee for downlinking of TV channels uplinked from India would be Rs.500,000 per channel per annum. Permission fee for downlinking of TV channels uplinked from abroad would be Rs 1.5 million per channel per annum.

Trai had initially recommended that for general entertainment channels, the total net worth requirement should be Rs.250 million for first channel, and enhanced by Rs100 million for each additional channel. But for news and current affairs channels, the total net worth requirement should be Rs1 billion for first channel, and enhanced by Rs.250 million for each additional channel. The Trai recommendations had come following a directive from I&B Minister Ambika Soni in October 2009 to examine whether there was need to put a cap on the number of TV channels in the country.

There are separate Policy Guidelines for permission/regulation of private satellite TV channels in India. While regulation of foreign TV channels uplinked from abroad and distributed in India for public viewing is governed by "Policy Guidelines for Downlinking of Television channels" notified on 11 November 2005, private TV channels which are uplinked from India are governed by "Guidelines for Uplinking from India" notified on 2 December 2005. Uplinking Guidelines also provide for permission and regulation of Teleports. After these Guidelines were notified, there has been an exponential growth of television channels, especially during the last few years.