I&B ministry issues IPTV guidelines

[ajuravi]

Monday - Sep 08, 2008
Televisionpoint.com Correspondent | New Delhi
The Information and Broadcasting ministry has issued guidelines for provisioning of Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) services in pursuance of Cabinet's decision of August 21, 2008. The guidelines will guide broadcasters to share their content with IPTV providers.

These guidelines bring clarity on various platforms capable of providing IPTV services, the regulatory provisions and licensing requirements and other issues to encourage stakeholders to launch IPTV.

Telecom access service providers having license to provide triple play services and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) with net worth more than Rs 100 crores and having permission from the licensor to provide IPTV or any other telecom service provider duly authorized by the Department of Telecom will be able to provide IPTV service under their licenses without requiring any further registration.

Cable TV operators registered under Cable Television Network (Regulation) Act, 1995 can also provide IPTV services without any further permission. However, the telecom licensees and cable operators will be required to give self certified declaration to I&B Ministry, Department of Telecom and TRAI indicating the detail of license or registration under which they propose to offer IPTV service.

IPTV services facilitate delivery of television content to the viewer through the technologies used for computer network instead of traditional format and cabling. It would require either a computer and software media player or an IPTV set top box to decode the images in real time. IPTV is a system where a digital television service is delivered using the Internet Protocol over a network infrastructure, which may include delivery by a broadband connection.

Several players will now launch the service in India and wrest their first mover advantage. Aksh Optifibre, in association with BSNL, has launched its service, iControl, in Jaipur and is looking to scale up operations aggressively. There are several other players in the fray, prominent among them being Wire and Wireless India, Bharti Airtel and Reliance Communications.

Analysts predict that there will be only 1,00,000 users of IPTV in India by 2012. It might be little time, then, before the concept catches on in the country.
http://www.televisionpoint.com/news2008/...1220883277

[~ArShAd~]

BSNL IPTV is too costly and they are King in putting high amount of Bill.