Service provider illegally openly showing foreign channels

While the service provider is admitting that the foreign channel is operating through 'piracy', the government sources are avoiding saying that it is difficult to detect piracy.

The broadcast of a foreign channel has been halted due to a dispute between the government and the tax authorities, mainly related to the implementation of the Alikart pricing system. The cable television service provider who charges the customer in advance is making the channel broadcast on the consumer's television through piracy. Due to this, the quality of the challans is sometimes being complained about.

The Indian operator has suspended service after local distributors have been unable to pay fees to Indian television networks for a year and a half. Around 60 Hindi and English television channels, including Sony, Zee, Star and Colors network, have been blocked since July 15. The distributors have been saying that they have not been able to pay nearly 1 billion rupees because they have not received foreign exchange facilities from Sakar. The government has asked to provide data including set-up box, subscribers, bouquet (package) of channels to implement the e-cart system, and said that television service providers and distributors have not provided the data, so the foreign exchange recommendation has been stopped.

The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology implemented the special cart price system in television service on 079 Chait 15. In this, the user can buy and watch only the channels he wants to watch, instead of paying for all the channels as is the case now. This system has not been fully implemented in practice even for so long. Although the new system has been announced, the service provider says that due to the delay in making and accepting the procedures, such as how to pay the fee and how much, the payment could not be made on time and now the Indian side has cut the downlink signal.

Meanwhile, television service providers have started bringing foreign channels to Nepali consumers' TVs through piracy and some by using Indian DTH (umbrella). Sudhir Parajuli, the president of Subisu Cable Network, who is also the president of Nepal Cable Television Federation, has admitted that most of the paid channels are shown illegally. However, he argues that it is 'legitimate piracy'.

"We have been regularly communicating our fees to the distributors, the distributors have not been able to pay the fees to the Indian broadcasters," Parajuli said, "We have already taken the money from the client and it is our responsibility to show them the content." Since we have already paid the fee to the distributor and TV channel is a monopolistic product, we can show it in any way because no one else sells these channels except the broadcaster to whom we have paid the fee.'

The Federation of Nepal Cable Television Businesses issued a statement on July 27 and stated that the Indian service providers are involved in broadcasting the channels in an unauthorized manner and thus the activities that are being carried out in collusion cannot be called piracy. "How fair is it to say that channel piracy has happened in Nepal by the illegal broadcasting of television programs through the Internet through various foreign illegal OTTs and through illegal Indian DTH and the same foreign free channel providers?" the statement said Why are they showing indifference to make foreign television channels such as Colors, Discovery and others geo-locked so that they cannot be watched in Nepal through DTH?' Information Technology Ministry spokesperson Gajendra Kumar Thakur said. "Even though the Indian channels are closed now, they are being operated through piracy, they are also being operated through OTT using VPN," he said. That also made it difficult. Where did the piracy come from, the process of monitoring has been difficult.'

Spokesperson Thakur said that the ministry is studying the medium and level of piracy. "This matter is being investigated, we will get to the root," he said. Section 26 of the Act prohibits importation of unauthorized copies. In case of violation of protected rights, punishment is provided according to Article 27, but the implementation aspect is lax. Spokesperson Thakur says that the Ministry of Communications has also planned to discuss the issue of copyright and intellectual property theft with Nepal Police, Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supply, and Nepal Telecommunication Authority.

According to the demand of the domestic television businessmen and distributors, the Ministry of Communication implemented the special cart price system in the television service on 079 Chait 15. But at that time, Indian Broadcasting and Digital Foundation, the umbrella organization of Indian channels, wrote to the Department of Information and Broadcasting and informed that it is not acceptable to make a bouquet (package) of channels and set prices for each channel separately. 080 The Department of Information and Broadcasting has asked to provide the price list of paid foreign channels by June 28, saying that Aala Kart will be fully implemented on July 1.

Subisuka Parajuli said that they have provided all the data to the ministry and distributors. He expressed his displeasure that after giving the data to the distributor, the ministry should consider it official and asked for the data again. "The broadcaster has also asked, the ministry has also asked, to whom should we give the data?"

Since July 17, Indian television networks have stopped broadcasting their channels in Nepal for non-payment. According to Dhruva Sharma, president of the Federation of Nepal Cable Television Businesses, this problem has become so complicated due to the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) who are bundling TV and selling it within the Internet after taking the Internet service license. "They are blaming distributors and broadcasters but there is no truth in that," Sharma said. With TV coming free on the internet, there was no point in ala cart. Because of this, the Alakart price system has not been implemented.' Sharma is of the opinion that to implement

ala kart, it should be mandatory to run television only in the set-up box. He says that a cable TV operator in Nepal, which has been saying that there are 1.3 million subscribers in Nepal, is giving the government only 1/2 million data. "If he has to pay money to Star, Zee, Sony channels for those 1.3 lakh customers, he has to pay 5-6 crores a month alone," said Sharma, "because of this, they have been reluctant to give the data to the government." On top of that, TV services are being bundled and sold on the internet. But when the customer buys internet, the NetTV charges are not shown separately in the bill. How to show the data to the government when it does not appear in the bill, this is also a problem.'

With the implementation of the Aala Cart system, it has been arranged that organizations such as Cable, MSO, DTH, IPTV, which distribute the signals of television channels, should maintain uniformity in the fees they can charge from the consumers. The organization has set a minimum charge of Rs 250 per month for television channels and Rs 40 per month for paid channels separately or on the basis of a bouquet of channels. According to the Ministry of Communication, you can take only 500 rupees per month including tax for both paid and minimum packages.