I&B ministry may grant licences to cable TV hubs without MHA nod

The ministry of information and broadcasting (MIB) is likely to start granting licences to and renewing licences of multisystem operators (MSO) without insisting on security clearance from the ministry of home affairs (MHA), officials aware of the development said on Monday.

MSOs are hubs for providing cable TV network services to consumers. According to an official, the decks have been cleared to allow the grant/renewal of licences to at least hundred MSOs who have been waiting since Delhi high court issued an order to the effect in August 2017.

“Earlier, permission to these MSOs was put on hold after it was made mandatory for MSOs to get security clearance from the MHA. On a writ petition from Sharma Cable Network, the HC passed an order on August 21, 2017, asking the ministry to issue the required permission. It is likely that the MIB will move on all applications now,” the official said. A second official said the decision to get MHA clearance for MSOs was taken ostensibly to stop the broadcast of illegal or unauthorised television channels in the country.

“After it emerged that televangelist Zakir Naik’s programmes on his channel, Peace TV, were being relayed in contravention of rules and some unauthorised programmes were being relayed from Pakistan that could threaten the security of the country, the MIB decided that the MHA should give security clearance to cable operators, even though the MHA itself did not think it was necessary to do so,” the second official said.

An MHA official declined to comment on the issue. Earlier, the MIB had said it did not have data on how many banned channels were being downloaded and aired illegally in the country as there was no monitoring mechanism for tracking unlawful broadcast. At present, only permitted news and general entertainment channels are tracked through the Electronic Media Monitoring Centre.

NEWDELHI::