I&B Ministry might make encryption of channels mandatory

Apurva Chandra, Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting told ET that the plan is under discussion.

The move will help stop the illegal broadcast of channels which don’t have the licences for DD freedish. The government wants to ensure that only those channels who buy slots on freedish are the ones who can broadcast.

MIB is likely to amend channel uplinking and downlinking rules. To prevent unauthorized receipt of signals, the proposed guidelines will mention that while the existing guideline allows a company to apply either in C or KU band, under the new proposal, uplinking can be done in the frequency band specified by the applicant. Uplinking in a band other than the C band has to be in encrypted mode.

The reason behind this move is said to be the unauthorised uplinking of a few regional news channels being done in unencrypted form via KU band.

“A few channels are being beamed on DD Freedish without the licences, causing a loss of over Rs 100 crore to the exchequer. The move will stop any an unauthorised receipt of channels,” a senior government official said.

The slots for broadcasting are auctioned on DD freedish every year. Last year, the average price for a news channel slot was Rs 17 crore.

The fresh auction for DD Freedish will be conducted in the next few days. The government is expecting to rake in a few hundreds of crores through this auction.