Paid TV Channels For Free? Supreme Court Directs Broadcasters To Seek Tribunal's Intervention
In July, TRAI imposed a condition on broadcasters, stating that if they offer free channels to Prasar Bharati, they cannot offer the same channels as paid ones to other operators.
The Supreme Court directed the Indian Broadcasting and Digital Foundation on Friday to move the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal for challenging the telecom regulator's amendments regarding the offering of certain paid channels.
A division bench of Justices PS Narasimha and Sandeep Mehta said although the IBDF is being directed to approach the TDSAT, it was being done only to ensure jurisdictional discipline. It clarified that the IBDF could move the top court against the amendment at a later stage.
In July, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India had imposed a condition on broadcasters that stated that if they offer a channel to public service broadcaster Prasar Bharati on its DD Free Dish platform, they cannot offer the same channel as a paid channel to other distribution platform operators.
The IBDF had moved the Kerala High Court against this amendment, but the high court refused to entertain the plea on the ground that the regulation under challenge had already been dealt with by the top court back in 2019.
The high court allowed the IBDF to move the TDSAT to challenge the amendment in question. However, the IBDF, along with Viacom18 Media and Star India, moved the top court instead.
In its plea before the top court, a copy of which has been reviewed by NDTV Profit, the IBDF stated that the present challenge was significantly different from the one adjudicated by the top court in 2019, as a fresh change had been introduced by TRAI in July.
In the plea, it argued that the changes introduced by TRAI materially affect the fundamental rights of the petitioners under Article 19(1)(a), 19(1)(g), and Article 14 of the Constitution. Article 19(1)(a) guarantees the right to free speech and expression, and Article 19(1)(g) guarantees the right to practice any profession, occupation, trade, or business. Article 14 deals with the right to equality.
The plea claimed that the petitioners would not only lose their viewers, they would also be constrained to terminate their agreements with Prasar Bharati, resulting in a situation where channels currently being received by millions of subscribers of private operators as part of packages would no longer be available to them. The petition before the top court was filed by advocate on record Puneet Singh Bindra.
