Edotorial 1: Towards transparency in OTT regulation

Context:

• It has been two years since the government issued the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules or new IT Rules 2021 through which the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MoI&B) was given the task of regulating content on OTT and online platforms.

OTT and their regulation:

• India’s approach can be termed as a light-touch ‘co-regulation’ model where there is ‘self-regulation’ at the industry level and final ‘oversight mechanism’ at the Ministry level. The Rules provide for a grievance redressal mechanism and a code of ethics. They mandate access control mechanisms, including parental locks, for content classified as U/A 13+ or higher and a reliable age verification mechanism for programmes classified as ‘A’ (18+).

OTT or over-the-top platforms, are audio and video hosting and streaming services which started out as content hosting platforms, but soon branched out into the production and release of short movies, feature films, documentaries and web-series themselves.Examples: Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video etc.

Towards media literacy

• Though the OTT Rules were notified in 2021, there is little awareness about them among the general public. The Rules mandate the display of contact details relating to grievance redressal mechanisms and grievance officers on OTT websites/interface.
• However, compliance is very low. In many cases, either the complaint redressal information is not published or published in a manner that makes it difficult for a user to notice easily. In some cases, the details are not included as part of the OTT app interface.
• This underlines the need for ensuring uniformity in the way OTT publishers display key information relating to their obligations, timelines for complaint redressal, contact details of grievance officers, etc. The manner, text, language and frequency for display of vital information could be enshrined in the Rules. The OTT industry associations could be mandated to run periodic campaigns in print and electronic media about the grievance redressal mechanism.
• The interpretation of age rating (UA 13+, for example) and the content descriptors ( ‘violence’, for instance) could be in the respective languages of the video (apart from English). Such provisions are embedded in law for display of anti-tobacco messages in films.
• The Rules could also provide for clear guidelines to ensure that a film’s classification/rating is prominent and legible in advertisements and promos of OTT content in print and electronic media.

Need for transparency

• A periodic audit of the actual existence and efficacy of access controls and age verification mechanisms and the display of grievance redressal details by each OTT platform may be undertaken by an independent body.
• While the Rules require disclosure of grievance details by publishers and self-regulating bodies, the reporting formats only capture the number of complaints received and decided. Instead, the full description of complaints received by OTT providers and self-regulatory bodies and decisions given thereon may be published in the public domain.
• The Ministry could consider facilitating a dedicated umbrella website wherein the details of applicable Rules, content codes, advisories, contact details for complaints/appeals, etc. are published. OTT providers and appellate/self-regulatory bodies can be made to upload the details of grievances and redressal decisions, which will be visible for the public and government authorities. This approach will aid in enhancing transparency.
• The current Rules provide for the third/final tier as the Inter-Departmental Committee (IDC) comprising officer-nominees from various ministries of Central government, and domain experts. The mechanism is such that while IDC recommends the course of action on OTT content violations, the Secretary of the Ministry is competent to take the final decision.
• The Supreme Court and High Courts have underlined the need for establishing a statutory body for regulating broadcast content. Pending the constitution of such a statutory regulator for the media, the IDC’s membership may be made more broad-based and representative and with security of tenure.
• There is no provision for the disclosure or publication of an apology/warning/censure on the platform or website. This may be incorporated in the Rules. Financial penalties on erring entities may also be provided. In the present era of media convergence, it is high time we evolve a common set of guidelines for content, classification, age ratings, violations, etc. so that content across platforms is governed uniformly.

Conclusion:

• India’s OTT regulatory model seeks to be an efficacious combination of self-regulation and legal backing. This is in line with the global trend. The I&B Ministry envisaged that India’s OTT regulations “would raise India’s stature at an international level and serve as a m

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Editorial 2: Smoke signals from the renewable energy sphere

Context:

• The formal launch of the Indian Oil Corporation’s (IOC) patented solar cook-stove at the India Energy Week 2023 (as part of the G-20 calendar of events) by the Prime Minister must be looked at closely from the point of view of India’s national energy story.

Crossroads in India’s renewable energy history

• While claiming the stove would soon reach 3 crore households within the next few years, central government also declared it as a “catalyst in accelerating adoption of low-carbon options” along with biofuels, electric vehicles, and green hydrogen. The government has claimed that the stove — priced at ₹15,000 — will transform cooking practices, save thousands of crores in LPG cost and forex, cut carbon dioxide emissions, and yield marketable carbon credits.
• These pronouncements have followed a 99% cut in the liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) subsidy (from the 2022-23 revised estimates) to low-income households in the 2023 union budget even as international fuel prices remain high.

A quest derived from crises

• The quest for renewable and decentralised technology in poor households has closely followed energy crises.

1. Among the government’s earliest attempt to transform household energy consumption was the solar cooker of the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), in the early 1950s. But it failed to address the household energy consumption of the rural poor as it cooked very slowly.
2. In the 1980s, the government turned to “improved chulhas” in its national energy policy. The programme sought to check deforestation by reducing fuelwood consumption and also benefit women’s health and finances. The sole incentive to adopt the “improved chulhas” was a 50% subsidy. But it also did not become accepted by poor households, mainly due to the stove’s construction and high maintenance costs.
3. Central government repackaged the scheme in 2009 as the ‘National Biomass Cookstove Initiative’, which has continued to totter on as the ‘Unnat Chulha Abhiyan’ from 2014.

• A 2004 report noted that cooking constituted 80% of a rural Indian household’s energy consumption. The International Energy Agency found that 668 million people in India depended on biomass for cooking and lighting in 2013, making India the largest consumer of fuelwood for household use.
• Today, despite the purported success of the government’s LPG scheme, unprecedented inflation in fuel prices and the gradual withdrawal of subsidies have forced women to resort to the chulha with all its hazards.

Interventions then and now

• There are obvious parallels between the government’s boost to IOC’s solar stove and this history:

1. a public-sector innovation with supposedly revolutionary impact after a fuel crisis
2. a gulf between state-subsidised schemes and its practical implementation;
3. the absence of any long-term goal to improve rural incomes (despite the correlation between per-capita income and type of energy consumption).

• But the similarities end here. While older interventions in the renewable sphere were led by the state and motley non-governmental organisations, which provided shallow fixes to deep social problems, today, the real action is elsewhere.

Ujjwala Yojana

• Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) is a government scheme under the Union Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas to distribute LPG cylinders to women from Below Poverty Line (BPL). The aim of the Ujjwala Scheme is to provide alternate clean fuel to prevent health issues associated with burning unhealthy fuel.

• Under this scheme, 8 crore identified beneficiaries were distributed 50 million LPG gas connections, in the names of adult women of the family. Union Budget for FY 21–22 provided for the release of an extra 1 crore LPG connections under the PMUY programme with a focus on families of migrants.

Conclusion:

• Public money is now funnelled into heavily subsidised large-scale private projects that produce green energy largely for commercial use. Today, technical innovation in renewable energy policy, despite its pretensions, serves to entrench a highly uneven energy landscape.
• odel for other nations to emulate.”