Telecom Regulatory Authority of India: Regulatory dreams

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s list of recommendations reads like the labours of Hercules. Anyone attempting to carry out these well-meaning but difficult propositions would be as stretched as the greatest of Greek heroes was in his 12 tasks. Trai recommends, “The entities (political bodies, religious bodies, urban, local, panchayati raj and other publicly-funded bodies, and Central and state government ministries, departments, companies, undertakings, joint ventures, and government-funded entities and affiliates) to be barred from entry into broadcasting and TV channel distribution sectors.” 

It is a moot point whether any government would have the political will to carry out such a complicated exercise, which, in effect, would be like waving a magic wand to bring in desirable media independence. Successive governments have struggled with freeing Doordarshan and All-India Radio from tight executive control. The censoring of Narendra Modi’s speech in the run-up to the elections was an enlightening case which showed up how the bureaucracy would bend over backwards to accommodate the will of the ruling dispensation. Government ownership of media, which is large in India given DD’s considerable terrestrial reach and AIR’s omnipresence over the airwaves, is a colonial legacy this democracy is unwilling to let go to the extent of making these behemoths independent of content control in an era of crowded digital competition.