MAM
IBF advises broadcasters to stop carrying TV commercials on net billing issue
Mumbai/New Delhi: The spat between TV channels and advertising agencies on the net billings issue took a new turn today with the former‘s association, the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF), telling its members to stop airing any TV commercials from 1 May.
At the time of writing, the response to the IBF missive was mixed with some broadcasters taking off commercials while others continued airing them.
The advisory sent last evening said ‘it is in our best interest that broadcasters consider net billing transaction from 1 April to avoid further litigious and tax related issue. To further avoid complications, the release orders were received for you to stop facing the scrutiny from authority. You are best off not carrying work on your channel unless the release orders have been changed for the transacted rate.”
A representative from a niche channel told indiantelevision.com that IBF‘s advisory is a word of caution and there is no clear cut statement saying that action will be taken against those who do not switch off the ads.
“We cannot afford to lose revenue which bigger players like Star and Sony can. Also, it is the channel‘s decision whether it should air ads or not. We are going against the advisory of IBF and not the diktat of the body.”
Also, ads being shown on channels are believed to have been released by agencies which are not the members of AAAI. The advertisements on channels carried during the Indian Premier League 6 (IPL) have also been exempted.
IBF secretary general Shailesh Shah told indiantelevision.com that all member channels have been asked to take ads off the air.
He said the stand-off will continue till the issue is resolved, adding that the television channels had given adequate warning to the advertising agencies.
Star CEO Uday Shankar told indiantelevision.com that the non-airing of ads will continue till the issue is resolved. “We have been negotiating with the agencies for nearly two months now. But it has not worked.”
Referring to his own group, he said ads of those media agencies which were okay with net billing were being carried.
Both Shankar and Shah refused to give details of losses per day to the TV channels, but said the amounts were ‘huge’.
The IBF had last month asked its members to send net bills to media agencies for television commercials carried on channels. These will replace the gross bills which used to be the norm. A month or so earlier, certain broadcasters received notices from the Income Tax Department on gross bills not having a deduction of TDS on 15 per cent agency commissions.
The IBF then decided to move over to the net billing system from the first billing cycle of April, something which the AAAI opposed. The IBF then told its members to defer the dispatch for another week to allow the IBF, the AAAI and the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA) to hammer out a solution.
“Broadcasters had last week started sending out net bills to agencies. AAAI had responded that its members would return the bills to broadcasters if they were not on a gross basis. It also said that joint representation should be made to government by the IBF and AAAI on resolving the issue. But the two could not come to terms on a common ground,” says a media observer. “Fearing that the impasse would continue, the IBF decided to take this extreme step.
Gross billing is the value of the bill including the 15% agency commission; net billing is the value of the bill minus the commission.
Digital
Content India 2026 opens with a copro pitch, a spice evangelist and a £10,000 prize for Indian storytelling
Dish TV and C21Media’s three-day summit puts seven ambitious projects before an international jury, and two walk away with serious development money
MUMBAI: India’s content industry gathered in Mumbai this March for Content India 2026, a three-day summit organised by Dish TV in partnership with C21Media, and it wasted no time making a statement. The event opened with a Copro Pitch that put seven scripted and unscripted television concepts before an international panel of judges, and by the end of it, two projects had walked away with £10,000 each in marketing prize money from C21Media to support development and international promotion.
The jury, comprising Frank Spotnitz, Fiona Campbell, Rashmi Bajpai, Bal Samra and Rachel Glaister, evaluated a shortlist that ranged from a dark Mumbai comedy-drama about mental health (Dirty Minds, created by Sundar Aaron) to a Delhi coming-of-age mystery (Djinn Patrol, by Neha Sharma and Kilian Irwin), a techno-thriller about a teenage gaming prodigy (Kanpur X Satori, by Suchita Bhatia), an investigative crime drama blending mythology and modern thriller (The Age of Kali, by Shivani Bhatija), a documentary on India’s spice heritage (The Masala Quest, hosted by Sarina Kamini), a documentary on competitive gaming (Respawn: India’s Esports Revolution, by George Mangala Thomas and Sangram Mawari), and a reality-horror competition merging gaming and immersive fear (Scary Goose, by Samar Iqbal).
The session was hosted by Mayank Shekhar.
The two winners were Djinn Patrol, backed by Miura Kite, formerly of Participant Media and known for Chinatown and Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey, with Jaya Entertainment, producers of Real Kashmir Football Club, also attached; and The Masala Quest, created and hosted by Sarina Kamini, an Indian-Australian cook, author and self-described “spice evangelist.”
The summit also unveiled the Content India Trends Report, whose findings made for bracing reading. Daoud Jackson, senior analyst at OMDIA, set the tone: “By 2030, online video in India will nearly double the revenue of traditional TV, becoming the main driver of growth.” He noted that in 2025, India produced a quarter of all YouTube videos globally, overtaking the United States, while Indians collectively spend 117 years daily on YouTube and 72 years on Instagram. Traditional subscription TV is declining as free TV and connected TV gain ground, forcing broadcasters to innovate. “AI-generated content is just 2 per cent of engagement,” Jackson added, “highlighting the dominance of high-quality human content. The key for Indian media companies is scaling while monetising effectively from day one.”
Hannah Walsh, principal analyst at Ampere Analysis, added hard numbers to the picture. India produced over 24,000 titles in January 2026 alone, with 19,000 available internationally. The country now accounts for 12 per cent of Asia-Pacific content spend, up from 8 per cent in 2021, outpacing both Japan and China. Key exporters include JioStar, Zee Entertainment, Sony India, Amazon and Netflix, delivering over 7,500 Indian-produced titles abroad each year. The top importing markets are Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, the United States and the Philippines. Scripted content dominates globally at 88 per cent, with crime dramas and children’s and family titles performing particularly strongly.
Manoj Dobhal, chief executive and executive director of Dish TV India, framed the summit’s ambition squarely. “Stories don’t need translation. They need a platform, discovery, and reach, local or global,” he said. “India produces more movies than any country, our streaming platforms compete globally, and our tech and creators win international awards. Yet fragmentation slows growth. Producers, platforms, and tech move in different lanes. We need shared spaces, collaboration, and an ecosystem where ideas, technology, and people meet. That is why we built Content India.”
The data, the pitches and the prize money all pointed to the same conclusion: India is not waiting for the world to discover its stories. It is building the infrastructure to sell them.
