I&B Ministry
MIB asks FM Phase III bidders to pay full amount by 1 October
NEW DELHI: All successful bidders for the 91 FM Radio channels in 54 cities that were announced yesterday in the first stage have been asked to pay the bid deposit – 25 per cent of the bid amount – by 21 September. The balance will have to be paid by 1 October.
Both amounts have to be paid by demand draft in the name of the Pay and Accounts Officer, Information and Broadcasting Ministry.
At the same time, the Ministry warned that if the bid deposit is not received by the due date, the earnest money deposit (EMD) will be forfeited, and if the balance is not received by 1 October, the bid deposit and EMD will be forfeited.
The Ministry also made it clear that this was without prejudice to any other action that it may take against defaulters.
While placing the results of 91 channels in fifty-four cities on the website of the Ministry, the frequency allocated and the successful bid amount was also stated.
The Ministry said the results do not include the results of the bids by Sun TV, South Asia FM and Kal Radio in compliance with the orders of the Madras High Court.
It also said the Centre had decided to file a special leave to appeal in the Supreme Court against the order of 26 July of the Delhi High Court of Delhi in the petitions by Digital Radio (Mumbai) Broadcasting Ltd. & Digital Radio (Delhi) Broadcasting Ltd. respectively.
Even as the government withheld six results because of legal cases, Entertainment Network India Ltd (ENIL) emerged the largest gainer with 17 channels in its kitty.
Rajasthan Patrika Pvt Ltd, Reliance Broadcast Network and DB Corp Ltd got 14 channels each. Meanwhile, Music Broadcast Pvt Ltd has got 11 channels and HT Media has 10 channels. Digital Radio (Delhi) Broadcasting Ltd and Abhijeet Realtors and Infraventures Pvt Ltd got two channels each.
Others who have successful bid and got one channel each are Digital Radio (Mumbai) Broadcasting Pvt Ltd, Renderlive Films and Entertainment Pvt Ltd, Sarthak Films Pvt Ltd, Abir Buildcon Pvt Ltd, Mathrubhumi Printing and Publishing Co Pvt Ltd and Odisha Television Ltd.
The auction was stopped on the 33rd day after just one round, with 97 channels in 56 cities became provisional winning channels with cumulative provisional winning price of about Rs 1156.9 crore against their aggregate reserve price of about Rs 459.8 crore.
I&B Ministry
India turns up the heat on piracy, orders Telegram to axe 3,142 channels and blocks 800 websites
New legal teeth, nodal officers and notices to intermediaries signal that the government is done playing nice with copyright thieves
NEW DELHI: India’s war on film piracy just got significantly more aggressive. The government has ordered Telegram to remove 3,142 channels distributing pirated content, blocked access to around 800 websites through internet service providers, and put the full weight of freshly sharpened legislation behind the crackdown. The message from New Delhi is unambiguous: the free ride for copyright thieves is over.
Minister of state for information and broadcasting L. Murugan spelled out the legal architecture to the Lok Sabha on Wednesday. The Cinematograph (Amendment) Act, 2023, he said, now contains specific provisions designed to make piracy a genuinely painful proposition. Sections 6AA and 6AB prohibit unauthorised recording and transmission of films, with violations attracting a minimum of three months’ imprisonment and a fine of Rs 3 lakh. At the upper end, offenders face three years behind bars and fines of up to 5 per cent of a film’s audited gross production cost — a figure that, for a big-budget production, could run into crores.
The legislation also gives the government powers to act against intermediaries hosting infringing content, by notifying them under Section 79(3) of the Information Technology Act, 2000, and compelling takedowns and blocking actions. Under Section 79(3)(b), intermediaries are legally required to remove or disable access to unlawful content upon receiving government notice or court orders. The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, add a further layer of obligation, requiring platforms to ensure their services are not used to host or distribute content that violates copyright or proprietary rights.
To put enforcement into practice, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has established a dedicated institutional mechanism, complete with nodal officers to receive complaints. Copyright holders, authorised representatives or individuals can report piracy through a prescribed format, after which the government issues notices to intermediaries to disable access to infringing links.
The most headline-grabbing action came on 11 March 2026, when Telegram was formally notified under Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act and directed to remove and disable 3,142 channels found to be distributing unauthorised content belonging to OTT platforms, content owners and producers. The complaints that triggered the action came from OTT platforms including JioCinema and Amazon Prime Video, which alleged that copyrighted films, web series and other material were being shared on the platform on a massive scale. Telegram’s architecture, with its large file-sharing limits and capacity for user anonymity, has made it a favoured vehicle for exactly this kind of large-scale piracy.
The Telegram action sits within a broader pattern of escalating enforcement. Just days before the Lok Sabha statement, the ministry banned five OTT platforms for streaming obscene content: MoodXVIP, Koyal Playpro, Digi Movieplex, Feel and Jugnu. In July 2025, the Centre ordered the blocking of 25 OTT platforms accused of streaming obscene, vulgar or pornographic material, a list that included ALTT, ULLU, Big Shots App, Desiflix, Boomex, Navarasa Lite, Gulab App, Kangan App, Bull App, Jalva App, ShowHit, Wow Entertainment, Look Entertainment, Hitprime, Feneo, ShowX, Sol Talkies, Adda TV, HotX VIP, Hulchul App, MoodX, NeonX VIP, Fugi, Mojflix and Triflicks.
Rule 3(1)(b) of the IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, provides the regulatory hook for those actions, prohibiting platforms from hosting content that is obscene, pornographic, invasive of privacy, gender-harassing, racially or ethnically objectionable, or that promotes hatred and violence.
For an industry that loses billions of rupees annually to piracy, the direction of travel is welcome. The question, as always, is not whether the laws exist, but whether the enforcement machinery can keep pace with the ingenuity of those determined to circumvent it. Three thousand channels down, and the pirates are already busy opening three thousand more.
