I&B Ministry
Day 25 of FM Phase III: Guwahati tots Rs 4.07 crore; up 976% than reserve price
NEW DELHI: On the 25th day of the e-auction for the first batch of FM Phase III cities, the surprise came from the North East where one channel in Guwahati fetched a price of Rs 4.07 crore as against its reserve price of just Rs 37 lakh, registering an increase of a whopping 976 per cent.
It may be recalled that a few days earlier, Bhubaneswar also set a record with a single channel getting the most competitive bidding increment-wise by going up nine times the reserve price.
On the other hand, after Varanasi (at Rs 12.29 crore today), it now looks like Jodhpur’s turn to enter the Rs 10 crore club in the e-auction as it showed an increase to Rs 9.22 crore. Even as the hope for revenue continues to rest on cities racing to the Rs 10 crore mark, the cumulative winning price at the end of the 100th round on the 25th day went up to Rs 1147 crore.
However, there has been no increase for almost a week in the number of provisional winning channels and cities – 94 channels in 56 cities – though the total bids surpassed the cumulative reserve price by Rs 688.3 crore or 150 per cent against the aggregate reserve price of about Rs 459 crore.
The cumulative provisional winning price has thus risen over the total reserve price of the first batch of 135 FM channels in 69 existing cities – Rs 550.18 crore – by Rs 597 crore or 108.5 per cent.
Kohlapur has now been static for a few days with Rs 9.44 crore and others waiting to enter the Rs 10 crore club appear to be Kanpur, Rajkot, Amritsar and Aurangabad, which have all got above Rs 6 crore.
Bid continue to elude 13 cities namely Asansol, Gulbarga, Mangalore, Mysore, Puducherry, Rajahmundry, Siliguri, Tiruchy, Tirunveli, Tirupati, Tuticorin, Vijaywada and Warangal even now.
The demand in most cities fell by up to three per cent and by four per cent below the excess demand at the price in the 100th round in Hyderabad.
The Percentage Price Increment applicable for the Next Clock Round rose to five each in Shillong and Varanasi but was just one in Guwahati and Jodhpur. There was no change in the other cities.
The winning price has risen by more than 100 per cent above their respective reserve prices in Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Aurangabad, Bengaluru, Bhubaneshwar, Chennai, Delhi, Guwahati, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Kolhapur, Mumbai, Nasik, Patna, Pune, Rourkela and Varanasi, all of which got provisional winning bidders at prices more than double the respective reserve prices.
The provisional winning price in the top three cities reflected no change: Delhi at Rs 169.16 crore (for just one channel), Mumbai at Rs 122.81 crore (for two channels) and Bengaluru at Rs 109.25 crore.
Chennai at Rs 53.38 crore, Ahmedabad at Rs 42.68 crore, Pune at Rs 42.03 crore, Jaipur at Rs 28.34 crore, Chandigarh at Rs 19.04 crore, Hyderabad at Rs 18 crore, Patna at Rs 17.89 crore, Cochin at Rs 15.04 crore, Nasik at Rs 14.66 crore and Lucknow at Rs 14 crore remained static.
Auction will now resume on Monday, 31 August.
I&B Ministry
AIDCF moves TDSAT over Waves plan to stream linear TV channels
Industry body flags regulatory gap as OTT push sparks broadcast turf war
NEW DELHI: The battle between traditional television distributors and digital platforms has found its way to the courts, with the All India Digital Cable Federation (AIDCF) moving the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) against Prasar Bharati’s latest OTT play.
At the heart of the dispute is Waves, Prasar Bharati’s OTT platform, which has invited applications to onboard linear satellite TV channels. Aidcf, which represents multi-system operators (msos), argues that this move sidesteps existing broadcasting rules and risks tilting the playing field in favour of digital platforms.
The federation’s petition hinges on a key provision in the Uplinking and Downlinking Guidelines, 2022. Clause 11(3)(f) allows broadcasters to downlink channels only if they provide signal decoders to recognised distribution platforms such as MSOS, DTH operators, hits operators and iptv platforms. OTT platforms, aidcf points out, do not feature on that list.
In simple terms, AIDCF’s argument is this: if OTT platforms are not officially recognised distributors, they should not be receiving broadcast signals in the first place. By inviting channels onto Waves, the federation claims, Prasar Bharati is opening a backdoor that lets broadcasters bypass long-standing rules.
The concern goes beyond legal interpretation. Aidcf says OTT platforms currently operate without a clear regulatory framework, allowing them to expand into traditional broadcasting territory without the compliance burden that cable and satellite operators must carry. That, it argues, creates an uneven contest.
There is also a warning for broadcasters. If they provide signal decoders to an OTT platform like Waves, they could risk breaching the very conditions under which their downlinking permissions were granted.
For its part, Prasar Bharati’s Waves initiative is positioned as a step towards wider access and digital reach, bringing linear television into the streaming era. But critics say the move blurs the line between regulated broadcasting and largely unregulated streaming.
The matter is expected to come up before tdsat next week. The outcome could do more than settle a single dispute. It may help define how India regulates the fast-merging worlds of television and OTT, where the lines are getting fuzzier by the day and the stakes, sharper than ever.
