Telecom Department suggests it won't regulate OTT services, but will regulate internet calls via apps

Looks like, the Net neutrality saga in India is finally on its way to reaching a consensus. A new  Economic Times report states that the telecom department has recommended against regulating any OTT services, but has called for a ‘regulatory oversight’ on apps offering local calls just like telcos. Earlier this year, the government had set up a six member panel to release a report on looking at the net neutrality issue. The team has reportedly suggested a new law that includes net neutrality principles and will replace the Indian Telegraph Act. The report clearly says that no user should be restricted to ‘receive, display, use, post any legal content, application or service on the Internet, or restrict any kind of lawful internet activity or use’. According to the news site, the report said, “The committee favours regulatory oversight on the communication service providers. The committee believes that for (other) OTT application services (including those offering messaging and international voice calls), there is no case for prescribing regulatory oversight similar to communication services.” Trying to ensure a level-playing field for all, DoT panel also said that apps offering local calls such as Viber and WhatsApp don’t follow regulations like mobile phone operators do, and this creates a ’non-level playing field between two providers offering similar services’. The DoT panel has also said that when replacing the current legal framework it must include principles of net neutrality. Until then, there should be a clause in the licence asking telcos and Internet service providers to follow net neutrality principles. The suggestions seem to be in line with the government’s stand on net neutrality that we’ve been hearing all along. Net neutrality means free and equal access to the Internet to all without any discrimination. Talking about the panel report, the news site further added, “Hitting the heart of the net neutrality debate, the report said a balance was required between ensuring Internet openness and reasonable use of traffic management by telcos and ISPs for legitimate needs.” The panel recommends legitimate traffic management, but is against ’exploitative or anticompetitive traffic management’, ‘application specific control within the Internet traffic’ and traffic prioritisation on paid basis. However, this isn’t the final report and the government is yet to take a call on the net neutrality policy in India. Before taking the plunge, it will be considering public consultation and TRAI’s recommendations. In the past, there were reports about how TRAI isn’t really buying Facebook’s Internet.org or Airtel Zero programs and DoT is also batting for net neutrality, and the telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had come forth to reveal that government stands for free and open Internet. The new DoT report is said to ‘be used to form framework for the government policy’ on net neutrality. While everyone awaits for the government’s decision, the volunteer group, SavetheInternet , has also been requesting that in the absence of a recommendation from TRAI and any decision from the government, telecom companies should be restricted from rolling out any plans and services that violate Net Neutrality. A lot has been said and written about Net Neutrality in the past couple of months. Click here  to know how it all started.