Assocham urges Trai to review differential pricing rule

KOLKATA: Industry body Assocham has urged the telecom regulator to review its order barring differential pricing of data services barring and restore tariffing flexibility for licenced operators.

The chamber has also opposed any restriction in the form of a telecom service provider (TSP)-agnostic platform for providing free data to consumers, arguing that such a proposal would add an unnecessary, additional layer between content providers, telcos and consumers, which could result in additional costs and reduced efficiencies, with no clear ownership for consumer grievances.

"The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) may find it a challenge in regulating such a platform under the provisions of the Trai Act,” Assocham warned in a statement Monday.

“Allowing technical and commercial flexibility with a level-playing field for all businesses in the internet value chain, including telecom operators will also promote the goals of broadband connectivity, attract investment and innovation, thus allowing consumer choice for internet access,” the chamber added.

Accordingly, the chamber feels India's telecom policy framework should encourage a variety of business models under its forbearance regime with regulatory oversight, rather than mandating or prohibiting certain practices.

Delegation of pricing flexibility from licensed TSPs to third-party platform owners, it said, would result in additional costs and be counter-productive to the objective of affordable internet for all, the Assocham spokesman said.

The chamber also cautioned that allowing unregulated third parties to provide free data would be detrimental to TSPs, which have heavily invested in infrastructure.

The chamber noted that European Union (EU) regulations and the US’s Open Internet Rules allowed differential pricing subject to certain boundaries, maintaining the Net Neutrality principle.

As a result, “they recognise it is imperative to provide technical and commercial flexibility to TSPs,” Assocham said.

Accordingly, Trai should take a holistic view on issues relating to OTT services, net neutrality, same service same rules and differential pricing and take a de-novo approach to the issue of provisioning free data, the chamber added.