Tech and startup industry bodies have again pushed back against calls by telecom operators to bring over-the-top (OTT) services under a licensing regime similar to telcos, and opening them up to taxation.
Ahead of public consultations on the issue later this week, the Internet & Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), NASSCOM, and the US India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), among others, have written to the government arguing against such efforts.
“OTTs are fundamentally different from telecommunication services and therefore, the same service-same rule does not apply. OTTs and Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) complement each other and do not compete, and furthermore, OTT service providers contribute immensely to the revenues generated by TSPs,” Nasscom said in a statement.
Any additional regulatory intervention, such as a licensing or authorisation framework, will lead to entry costs on the industry, increase the cost of service which could be passed on to consumers, and thereby stymie the virtuous economy OTTs are contributing to, it added.
The latest war of words between telecom operators and tech interests comes after the former suggested that OTT communication services are covered under the new Telecom Act as an access service. Telecom operators have been demanding ‘same service, same rules’ for OTT players that provide communication services like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Google Meet, Telegram, etc.
“All such statements by these few stakeholders are incorrect, motivated by their narrow commercial interests, and devoid of any basis. The majority of stakeholders have not even mentioned this as an issue for discussion,” Broadband India Forum, a think tank for the broadcast sector which counts global tech giants such as Amazon, AT&T, Cisco, and Google, said.
None of these stakeholders have taken into consideration the adverse impact such a pan-India unified service authorisation is likely to have on smaller and niche service providers, who offer specific services in specific service areas, BIF, which also includes government entities such as BSNL and the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) under the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), as members.
The Internet & Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) said OTT services are not within the scope of the Telecommunications Act, 2023.
Status of OTTs
However, officials at the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) stressed the wording of the Act leaves the status of OTTs open.
The 46-page Telecom Act passed in Parliament in December last year defined telecommunications services as “any service for telecommunications”. Initial drafts of the Bill had specifically extended the definition to OTT services such as messaging platform WhatsApp and video calling programme Skype, among a wide range of specialised communication services, including machine-to-machine communication, in-flight and maritime connectivity.
This was demanded by telecom service providers such as Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio, who had argued OTTs offer audio and video calls and messaging without paying licence or spectrum fees.
In the absence of modern legislation, many technologies such as OTTs were judicially interpreted to be under the erstwhile Indian Telegraph Act as well as the IT Act, 2000. To remove all confusion, OTTs will be regulated by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology’s (MeitY) upcoming Digital India Bill, then-Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw had said.
But DoT officials said OTTs in general, and communications OTTs in particular, remain a grey area until further clarity is provided by the government.
First Published: Aug 19 2024 | 7:09 PM IST
