Pradip Baijal, Chairman, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI)

Known for his ability to call a spade a spade, this top bureaucrat has traversed various key roles in government -- state and the center -- with ease and grace. Pradip Baijal, a 1966 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS officer, is an ardent supporter of globalization. His innings at the central power ministry saw him unleash a set of reform measures for the power sector. Baijal held sway as the all-powerful secretary, Ministry of Disinvestment, from 1999-2003, laying down the entire gamut of rules and regulations for privatization. As Chairman, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Baijal currently regulates the complex telecom, cable and the broadcast sector. In an in-depth interview, Baijal spoke to media columnist Rakesh Khar, Programme Director, Journalism and Mass Communication Programme, Jaipuria Institute of Management, Noida, for exchange4media.com on convergence of communications, the media business and FM policy. Excerpts:

Q. CAS received criticism for its alleged failure to address certain critical issues like choice of free-to-air channels, choice of pay channels, choice of STB, issue of under-declaration and piracy and above all the signal service quality. Are you going to address these issues?

We are working on a detailed consultative paper on the TV business, more so from the CAS perspective. We are keen to go through each and every issue involved at length. The issues you raised are critical to the television business and I am confident we will address them. There obviously are conflicting stakes and interests. We hope to come out with a detailed paper on CAS by the end of the month or early September.

Convergence is happening all over the world. Technology is the big driver of convergence. Convergence actually has a huge end-consumer interface. Consumers stand to gain immensely, the market will multiply manifold as in telecom, and there will be enough space created for existing and new players to operate freely. The TRAI recommendations are open for discussion till August 31, and the final unified regime paper will reach the government by mid-September. There are complex issues involved.

Why are we talking today of a unified license? The era of a natural monopoly in telecom has now been happily reversed. When you go beyond telecom, you look at convergence, and that is when you need that much more regulation.

It was in January that government notified TRAI as a broadcast regulator. You must remember that TRAI is only a carriage regulator. We know what the mandate is and we are very keen to stick to it. It is only at the second stage that there may be a need for a regulator for both content and carriage. Again, there are two views on that. Who should regulate content and carriage? There is a view that content and carriage belong to the same domain while there is another view that a technical body should not regulate content? Then there is this view in the media that content should not at all be regulated.

The Information and Broadcasting minister, Mr. Jaipal Reddy, has recently said that there would be an independent regulator for the content issue. As of now I am not looking at it (content issue) at all. I would be happy to stick to my brief. Content indeed is a complex issue and we do not have the core competence to dwell on it. Should there be a case, we will develop relevant expertise.

In the UK there is a similar policy. I do not know why there is a hue and cry on this issue. You have a right to watch the Republic Day parade and no one should say ‘I have got the rights and I will not show it to you’. To prevent this, the public broadcaster should have the freedom to show all events of national importance, including popular sports played in India.

Yes, it is not simple and easy. There are obviously complex issues inherent to the broadcast business. What we know is that we are new to the broadcast sector. We are in the learning stage. We are trying to set up machinery that helps us take a considered view on the complexities involved in the broadcasting business.

Dealing with the FM issue in media has been a great learning experience. We are looking at each issue minutely using the learning from other countries as well. We have been in this assignment for just about six months. We will settle down and deliver. And, as I said earlier, we have currently a mandate only to look at the carriage issue and not the content issues. Content issues, of course, are far more intricate.

Yes, concentration of media ownership is a serious issue. As a regulator, I think it is important to bring about an end to virtual monopolies in any sector, more so in media, and that too in a country like India. Our view is that there is a need to look in-depth into the monopoly issues in media. There are established norms in developed media markets on this and there is need to set up a similar framework for media in India. Cross-media holding restrictions are a tested format to end fears that any monopoly in media brings with it.

You cannot do anything about it. It is all because of the technology march and that is something, which is unstoppable.

The government has a role to play. It cannot stop thinking and acting. Polices are always in evolution and the fast changing media scene in India should not wait for one big single policy. As and when the convergence policy comes, it will take into account the learning from the past. But there cannot ever be a paralysis of the thinking process in the government.

None, if the issue is decided upfront and not by proxy. There is need to be transparent about it and I guess the government will be transparent. The courts are also taking a view on this.

Yes, I am all for allowing news on private radio. There cannot be two sets of policies--one for television and another for radio. That is just not fair. But radio has a tremendous reach and without a monitoring mechanism in place it may be risky to open private radio to news. Let the mechanism be in place.

Also, we have raised the issue of monopoly power in dissemination of news and current affairs in India. There should not be a case where one big operator with a wide reach is giving you news on radio, print, magazine, Internet and TV. The monopoly issue in media, as I said earlier too, needs to be examined at length, that too quickly.

In 1991 there were so many changes in the way business was run in this country, with an obvious disadvantage at times to the incumbents. But everyone is happy today. I do hope that the relevant stakeholders understand that nothing can stop globalization.

I do agree that the unified licensing regime will alter the way business is conducted in the media and communications domain. It calls for readjustment of business models in the incumbent industry. But we want to ensure that we do not ruin the business of existing players. We have provided for a five-year time frame to move to the new regime. To ensure a level playing field we propose stricter entry norms -- not barriers -- for new players.

This is not my mandate. If the government wants TRAI to study this, we will do so happily.

I think the feedback by and large is positive. Our view is three fold: there is need to bring in a level playing field between the state-owned players and the private sector; there is need to ensure there is money to be made in the radio business, and last but not the least, the incumbent players are given an opportunity to migrate to the new business environment with ease. FM players are currently losing lots of money and it is time to reverse the trend.

Our experience has shown that the concept of an independent telecom regulator has led to a revolution of sorts for the end consumer: the inter-connect regime is on; prices of the service have come down while the quality has improved, and so has the choice increased. From the business point of view, the market has grown and grown. Our objective is to achieve all this and more in the broadcasting sector as well.

There is a potential for 500 FM stations in the country but for these to run successfully you cannot have the existing 20 stations bleeding. You cannot also have a case where there are 20 stations operating under one regime and 480 other stations operate under another regime. That will lead to chaos.

This is the reason we have proposed a transparent system for the current players to migrate to the new regime. But for being able to do so, they have to exit the current regime and the environment in which they operate. There is an option for an existing player wishing not to migrate: it can actually exit the radio business in a 12-month time frame.

You will agree that FDI is a political and emotive issue in India. FDI in media is an even more sensitive issue. We have made a beginning and hopefully it should only get better. But I maintain that it is an issue that is best decided by the government.

It is not in my official mandate to speak on this. I have no private view whatsoever on this issue.

You are in an environment where you have to integrate with the rest of the global economy. I cannot have a situation where, if there are only five top aluminum players in the world, in India we will encourage 10 players to come in. It has been demonstrated that whenever there is growth, there will be mergers and acquisitions and the industry will consolidate itself. I do not see a case for monopoly here. Then there is the Competition Act. There is perhaps a case here not to look at monopoly by ownership but by the abuse of monopoly power.