What our new telecom regulatory law should look like

Source– The post is based on the article “What our new telecom regulatory law should look like” published in the Mint on 7th September 2022.

Syllabus: GS3 – Infrastructure

News– The article gives suggestions related to the newly proposed regulatory system by the government of India for the telecommunications sector.

What is the current regulatory structure in the telecommunication sector?

It is regulated by Telegraph Act,1985. It is the colonial era legislation which has been interpreted many times. Its meaning has been extended well beyond the original intent and license has become its predominant feature.

Government has come up with a consultation paper to develop a new regulatory framework that emphasizes on simplification, comprehensibility and regulatory certainty to promote investment.

What are the suggestions that can  be incorporated in the proposed regulatory structure ?

(a) Government should do away with the license regime. It should encode regulatory obligation into the law.

(b) Authorization to provide a service should be granted through a simple approval letter that incorporates by reference the provisions of law and specific rules that will apply.

(c) We need to do away with licenses that are redundant. It refers to the service that is no longer required or can be provided through software more efficiently. One example is Audiotex license that regulates conference call services.

(d) We need to simplify the complex set of categories and sub-categories for the services provided by the telecom sector. We need to categorize telecom companies solely based on whether they provide carriage or access service. For example;

Carriage service provider-They build and maintain the infrastructure of telecom networks that connects operators in different locations. They should be authorized to provide service to telecom service providers and not directly to customers.

Access service provider-They should be authorized to deal with customers. They can be further divided by function whether they provide only data service or both voice and data service.

(e) All these regulations should be technology neutral by design to save them from becoming redundant on technology change. The regulatory distinction between plain voice service and voice over internet protocol should be removed so that they can be freely converted to each other.