Net Neutrality in India: Ensuring openness amidst the Crisis

AutorSmriti Parsheera
Ocupação do AutorResearch Fellow at the CyberBRICS Project and a Fellow at the National Institute of Public Finance & Policy, New Delhi, where she focuses on technology policy research
Páginas69-74
69The Value of Internet Openness in Times of Crisis
In theprevious articlewe traced India’s journey down the net neutrality road,
starting from the framing of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India
(TRAI)’s discriminatory tariff regulation in 2016 to the present debate on cre-
ation of an advisory multi-stakeholder body. Our focus here is to discuss the
ways in India’s net neutrality rules might interact with recent developments sur-
rounding the COVID-19 pandemic.
5.1 TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT DURING THE CRISIS
One of the consequences of the lockdown imposed due to the COVID-19 crisis
has been the increase in data consumption, leading to increased pressure on
the networks. As perreports1, there has been a surge of about 30 percent in the
average data consumption, a large part of which is said to be on account of
video content. This led the telecom industry body, Cellular Operators Associ-
ation of India (COAI), to write to the Department of Telecommunications
(DoT) and various over-the-top video providers like Netflix, Amazon Prime,
Disney+ Hotstar and ALTBalajiseeking their co-operation2in mitigating net-
work congestion.
Some of the major players in the digital content industry collectively responded
to this issue througha press release3declaring their decision to take temporary
steps to ease the pressure on mobile networks. The measures being adopted by
FIVE
Smriti Parsheera
Net Neutrality in India:
Ensuring Openness Amidst the Crisis
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