I&B Ministry
I&B Secretary Sanjay Jaju calls for AI-led entertainment growth at CII Big Picture Summit
MUMBAI: Artificial intelligence is barging into India’s media and entertainment business, and the country must use it to jump from a bit-player to a global powerhouse. That was the message from Sanjay Jaju, secretary, ministry of information and broadcasting, who urged the industry to convert its creative capital into world-class products.
Speaking at the opening of the CII Big Picture Summit in Mumbai, Jaju said the WAVES Summit should not remain a one-off event but become a continuing drive for innovation and transformation.
“The summit is more than an event. It is a movement,” he said, invoking the prime minister’s call for each wave to push the nation further. “It should force us to reflect on where we stand and how we move ahead together.”
Entertainment, he noted, is not merely leisure but a pillar of society and a source of employment and harmony. The creative economy already fuels more than 10 million jobs and contributes nearly Rs 3 lakh crore to the GDP.
A billion stories with a two per cent market share
India’s storytelling legacy is deep and diverse, yet its current share of the more than USD 2 trillion global entertainment market is only two per cent.
“Our challenge and opportunity is to turn creative potential into globally recognised products and stories,” Jaju said. “If we do not embrace new technologies, our share will shrink. India’s stories must be heard and seen worldwide. This is our soft power.”
Government’s responsibility, he added, is to facilitate and support the sector by building capacity, providing incentives and ensuring a level playing field.
Jaju cited the Indian Institute of Creative Technologies in Mumbai as an example of effective public-private collaboration in nurturing world-class talent.
A reform roadmap for global competitiveness
The summit also saw the release of the CII White Paper on policy priorities for the creative economy. The paper outlines steps to strengthen innovation, skill development and India’s international competitiveness.
Industry leaders expressed strong alignment with the government’s vision.
Gaurav Banerjee, chair of the CII national council on media and entertainment and MD and CEO of Sony Pictures Networks India, called for specialised talent institutions, regional clusters and faster collaborative action. “India is a nation of 1.4 billion stories. Global demand is rising and we must scale creators to match,” he said.
Rajan Navani, co-chair of the council and MD and CEO of Jetsynthesys, said AI is fast becoming a creative partner, and stressed the need for trust-based frameworks to fuel innovation and skills.
Gunjan Soni, country MD, YouTube India, highlighted the importance of safety and responsibility as content creation becomes increasingly democratised.
Conclusion
India’s media and entertainment sector has the talent, technological momentum and ambition to break through globally. What it needs now is focus, scale and the confidence to ensure India’s stories conquer worldwide audiences.
I&B Ministry
IT Rules tweaks are clarificatory, not expansion of powers: MeitY
Govt signals flexibility as platforms push for clarity on user content rules
NEW DELHI: The Centre has sought to dial down concerns over its proposed amendments to the IT Rules, with Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology secretary S Krishnan asserting that the changes are intended as clarifications rather than an expansion of regulatory powers.
Pushing back against criticism from platforms and civil society, S Krishnan said the amendments “do not in any way actually give us wider powers” and are meant to remove ambiguity in how existing provisions are applied. He added that the trigger came largely from within the ecosystem, with intermediaries themselves seeking clearer guidance on compliance, takedowns and record preservation.
At the heart of the debate is the growing friction between platforms and policymakers over responsibility for user-generated content. Intermediaries have argued that they should not be treated on par with publishers, particularly when content is created and uploaded by users. Krishnan acknowledged this concern, noting that “a sharper distinction” between user content and publisher content is needed and is currently under examination.
The issue becomes more complex in enforcement scenarios. While registered publishers can be directly asked to modify or remove content, intermediaries often lack control over the original creator. “In such cases, the intermediary cannot direct those changes,” Krishnan explained, underlining the need for procedural nuance.
Another key proposal under discussion is to bring user-generated news and current affairs content within a more unified regulatory ambit, potentially under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The move follows suggestions that a single authority should handle such content, regardless of whether it originates from a publisher or an individual user.
Even as the government frames the amendments as a tidy-up exercise, fault lines remain. Industry players have flagged concerns over compliance burdens, especially for smaller businesses, and questioned whether advisories could effectively become binding without explicit legislative backing. Krishnan said the government is mindful of these risks and is exploring ways to ease obligations, including possible relaxations under certain provisions.
The ministry is also considering consolidating multiple advisories and guidelines into a more structured framework, a step widely seen as addressing long-standing confusion over what platforms are expected to follow.
On takedowns, the government has reiterated that due process will remain unchanged. Krishnan stressed that actions will continue to be governed by established procedures, with reasons recorded and review mechanisms in place. He also pointed to the surge in deepfakes and synthetic media as a factor behind rising content disputes, calling it a “scale challenge” for regulators.
Interestingly, Krishnan also framed social media platforms as commercial entities rather than pure vehicles of free expression, hinting at a broader shift in regulatory thinking as platform economics come into sharper focus.
With stakeholders seeking more time and, in some cases, a rollback of the proposals, the government has kept the consultation process open-ended. Krishnan said further revisions remain on the table, signalling a willingness to adapt the draft based on feedback.
For now, the message from MeitY is clear: the rules may not be tightening in intent, but the effort to define them more clearly is well underway.
