Placing channels at multiple LCNs against rule, says Trai

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has noted that placing television channels at more than one Logical Channel Number (LCN) was in violation of the regulations.

The observation comes amid the ongoing battle between Arnab Goswami’s Republic TV and other English news channels over the issue of dual LCNs.

Issuing a directive, Trai also warned Multi-System Operators (MSOs) against resorting to such a practice. “It has come to the notice of the authority that several MSOs providing cable TV services are placing some channels at more than one LCN under multiple genres simultaneously. Therefore, all MSOs are hereby advised to strictly comply with the extant regulatory framework in letter as well as in spirit, failing which action will be taken against such operators,” it said.

Trai views such a practice as “a material non-compliance” of the extant regulatory framework, it added. The regulator, however, did not mention Republic TV.

A few days ago, the National Broadcasters Association (NBA) had filed a complaint with Trai, accusing Republic TV of adopting “unethical distribution practices” to boost its rating points.

In its complaint, the NBA also appealed to BARC (TV audience measurement data collector) not to release data for the English general news category for week 19, 2017, claiming that the rating was “corrupted due to unfair distribution tactics” adopted by Republic TV.

DH News Service