The News Broadcasters and Digital Association have written to the Union I&B secretary, expressing serious concerns about the Department of Telecom’s intention to allocate C-Band spectrum for 5G telecom services, claiming that this will significantly reduce the C-Band spectrum available for broadcast services.

The NBDA has argued that the proposal under consideration by the Department will commercially benefit a certain section of telecom operators and result in monopolistic operations that are ‘directly prejudicial to the entire satellite broadcasting industry in India’ in a letter seeking urgent intervention from the I&B ministry and directions to the DoT not to take any unilateral decision without consultations with stakeholders.

It further stated that, in addition to harming the sector, such a move would have a negative influence on freedom of expression and media expression.

According to the Times of India, the NBDA has stated that the government’s intention to distribute the C-Band spectrum to telecom service providers in order to enable 5G services poses a ‘gigantic’ threat to the broadcast industry’s fundamental existence.

“The entire broadcast industry relies on C-Band signals for uplinking and downlinking.” This resource is distributed amongst multiple stakeholders in order to make approximately 900 channels available to subscribers in India via various distribution platforms operators,” the NBDA stated, adding that this was done not only in accordance with the internationally coordinated International Telecommunication Union, but also with India’s own National Frequency Allocation Plan.