[Reader-list] DoT-IT fight over Net service license

[Kanti Bit]

Dear All,

Here is some new development regarding the Concergence
Bill. The two government arms - Dot and IT ministry -
are now fighting over the proposal in the Bill to
license Internet services. 

Read the story in Hindustan Times:
<http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/170601/detECO01.asp>

DoT, IT ministry lock horns over licensing of Net
services 

Prerna K. Mishra & Shalini Dagar 

New Delhi, June 16 

EVEN AS the deadline approaches for the group of
ministers to clarify the ambiguities in the revised
draft Communication Convergence Bill, the ministry of
information technology (MIT) and department of
telecommunications (DoT) have locked horns over the
contentious licensing issue. 

While Dot is in favour of regulating content
application and value-added services, included in the
revised bill, MIT is strongly opposed to the move. The
bill is expected to be introduced in the monsoon
session beginning on July 24. 

While Minister of Information Technology Pramod
Mahajan has categorically opposed the move to regulate
services calling it a retrograde step, the department
of telecommunications insists that some regulation is
called for. 

DoT would like to go with the provisions of the
National Telecom Policy-99. "Since registration of
other service providers is mandatory under NTP 99,
therefore, a similar registration process is desirable
under the new regime. The reason is simple. An
estimate of the total number of players in the sector
is often required for allocation of resources like
bandwidth," said a DoT official. 

While DoT is clearly skirting the issue of licensing,
it maintains that regulation through registration is
imperative. 

However, according to industry sources, even
registration in itself is a clumsy and
straight-jacketed form of regulation. The case by case
approvals given for operating call centres in the
present regime is a case in point. According to the
affected parties, on an average a call centre requires
24 approvals which takes arraign six months to
materialise. 

The paranoia of the industry stems from the fact that
under the revised Communication and Convergence Bill,
services like Internet, unified messaging, IT-enabled
services like call centres, tele-banking, e-commerce,
e-trading, telemedicine, tele-banking video
conferencing etc, will also require a licence. 

The latest version of the bill has also added
Internet-based contents on the website into the list
of content application services which will require a
license. 

As the confusion rages on, experts are busy studying
the options available to the GoM. 

The revised version of the bill incorporates the
comments and suggestions received after posting the
draft bill prepared by the sub-group on Convergence in
January 2001. 
==============

Kanti Kumar