New Delhi: The Telecom Regulatory Authourity of India (TRAI) has floated a new consultation paper pertaining to net neutrality. While the TRAI’s earlier consultation papers were about establishing the need for net neutrality, today’s paper comes after the Department of Telecom (DoT) asked TRAI to deliberate on certain recommendations it made to the government around net neutrality, namely those around traffic management practices (TMPs) used by telcos and Internet service providers and the establishment of a multi-stakeholder body.
“The government has adopted the principle of net neutrality, which means networks must treat all traffic as equal. However, there are exceptions, situations that create traffic conditions,” said R.S. Sharma, Chairman of TRAI. The TRAI had intimated earlier that a public consultation paper on these subjects will be floated soon.
According to Sharma, networks may want to suspend traffic in the case of congestions. Similarly, certain critical applications like a pacemaker that is transmitting data, may need to be treated differently and wouldn’t fall under the same net neutrality rules as all other data. The new paper aims to establish these practices.
“It is pertinent to add here that the issue of laying standards of quality of service to be provided by the service providers shall continue to remain in the domain of TRAI. Accordingly, it is reiterated to recommend necessary Traffic Management Practices (TMPs) for consideration of Do,” The Department of Telecom (DoT) told TRAI about its net neutrality recommendations.
Further, the TRAI had also recommended the formation of a body that would enforce the traffic management practices and net neutrality laws in India. “Because it is a technology driven process, the TRAI had recommended the formation of a multi-stakeholder body that would enforce these rules,” said Sharma.
“With reference to multi-stakeholder body, the variance is not with respect to recommendations per se, but their implementation,” the TRAI paper says.
Sharma clarified that the Department of Telecom (DoT) has asked TRAI to deliberate on this and figure out what “the structure must be for this body”. The new consultation paper has been floated for the same.
On the other hand, Nikhil Pahwa, founder of savetheinternet.in, said setting up an external body, like the one proposed by TRAI, is not a good idea. “This approach of setting of bodies allows the regulator to defer monitoring, and sometimes decision making to third parties. In principe, I don’t think this is the right approach, the regulator must build internal capacity, monitor situations and take decisions by themselves,” he added.
Source: Livemint
