The Hindu Business Line : Cabinet to refer channel uplinking norms to GoM

It will look into issues such as sharing telecast rights of sporting events with the national broadcaster Prasar Bharati and allowing foreign institutional investors to invest in news and current affairs channels.

Addressing newspersons after the Cabinet meeting, the Information and Broadcasting Minister, Mr Jaipal Reddy, said, "The Union Cabinet decided to refer the up-linking norms to a GoM, which has been asked to submit its report in a couple of weeks." He added that the Prime Minister would constitute a GoM to look into these norms.

The I&B Ministry had proposed that sports events of national importance be shown on Doordarshan's terrestrial network as well. "Presently, there is no such provision in the guidelines," he said. Most of the sports events are show on Doordarshan after the intervention of court, as there are no guidelines in this regard.

However, sources said that some members of the Cabinet felt that it is essential to look into this issue in greater detail. Earlier, it was proposed that Prasar Bharati would pay a fee to acquire rights and also share a part of the revenues generated with the rights holder.

Besides this, the up-linking policy favoured allowing investments by FIIs, Overseas Corporate Bodies, Persons of Indian Origin and non-resident Indians within the 26 per cent cap in news and current affairs channels just as in the print media.

It had also suggested that both news and general entertainment channels should be allowed to uplink using the Ku-band. Currently, channels are up-linking through the C-band and only direct-to-home (DTH) operators use Ku-band.

Mr Reddy said the Ministry had also proposed giving year-long licences to foreign news channels and agencies present in India for the coverage of live events. Currently, these channels are required to seek permission on an event-to-event basis.

"All these proposals are part of the proposed up-linking policy and the Cabinet has referred the matter to a GoM, which has been asked to submit its report in a couple of weeks," he said.

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