The NDTV Dialogues With Ram Sewak Sharma, Head of TRAI: Full Transcript

New Delhi: On the NDTV Dialogues, the man who made headlines globally after his ruling on net neutrality. He's now making headlines again after taking on Telecom operators over call drops, the chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Ram Sewak Sharma.

Following is the full transcript of The NDTV Dialogues with Ram Sewak Sharma:

NDTV: Hello and welcome to The NDTV Dialogues, a conversation of ideas. Today the man who made headlines globally after his ruling on net neutrality, he's now making headlines again after taking on Telcos over call drops. Joining me now, is the Chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Ram Sewak Sharma. Thank you very much Sir for coming. Mr Sharma, a quiet, unassuming, hardworking bureaucrat took on one of the most powerful men in the world, you were trending globally at that time. Did you ever feel pressured of what the implications of your order may mean and especially given the high pitch campaign that accompanied the whole debate around this?

RS Sharma: Well first of all let me tell you that I am not really a high-powered fellow. I am a very normal bureaucrat, a normal public servant and actually what we had done, we never thought in those terms to who is putting pressure and who is saying what. We went specifically by the merit and we had an open mind when we started this whole debate and consultation paper. So I would say that I was just doing my duty.

NDTV: You had at the time, had just about a week before you, your final report came out, you were quite tough about the kind of pressure being put on, the kind of opinions you were getting and I think some lakhs of opinions on one certain way for Facebook and you made the point that you wouldn't take well to this pressure at all.
 
RS Sharma: No, I don't think I ever made that point. What I said was that TRAI's consultation process goes like this; that we articulate the issues and then we ask certain questions and essentially ask people to contribute to these questions; what instead we got, and in millions of these responses, were not really addressing those questions. So what I had said was that we want to reach out to these people and actually request them, that these are our questions and we would be grateful if you could send us your specific answers to these questions, because then they would be helpful for us in formulating the policy on this issue. So this was essentially the conversation which we had before the order was out.

NDTV: As I said when it became a Ram Sewak Sharma versus Mark Zuckerberg, as I said when you were trending, did you find that an unusual situation?
 
RS Sharma: Well, it may be unusual but the whole issue was the Free Basics, which you are mentioning, that was not even a part of our consultation process. We never said anything about a product because I consider Free Basics as a product and what we were actually, what consultation was going on was that essentially differential pricing and we had requested the concerned telecom service provider to suspend the commercial roll out of that product, essentially because that product was using that architecture of differential pricing. So essentially you know it will be wrong to say that we were targeting a particular product or the consultation was about a product.

NDTV: Let me give you the arguments from the other side, because this has been discussed a lot as well. Mark Zuckerberg had written saying that, who on the earth could be against this because Free Basics looks at the concept that if you have a free library, you don't have every book possible there. If you have basic health care, you won't have all the healthcare options available there. This is a way to provide the poorest of the poor the Internet services that they need. Others have said that this is about the elite trying to keep the Internet to themselves. It's not letting the Internet be open to the poor of India of over a billion people. How would you look at those arguments?

RS Sharma: No I think, I had said earlier also that we, certainly TRAI or nobody else can have an argument that people should not have access to the data or to the Internet and free of course. The freer the better, so that's not really the issue, the issue was whether you use that architecture of using free data services only through one pipe. It's like saying this that I have certain number of shops in CP and you will be having a discount on these shops only when you come through a particular road. That I don't think is appropriate. What we were saying was that if you want to give discount on those shops, the discount should be available to anybody coming from any road, so long as the guy reached that shop, he should be eligible for a discount. So essentially we are not against free data, what we were saying is that you should not use this business model of providing that data through a given pipe.
 
NDTV: It's interesting you use the word business model because that also becomes controversial. When you say that, do you see it as a battle for haves and have-nots of the Internet? How do we resolve that issue because it is true that in India access to Internet would be like access to education in one sense? How do we provide this access?

RS Sharma: Essentially we are for the access, and cost is one of the issues. I mean whether the data should be available at a cost or whether available for free, that's only one of the issues. There are connectivity issues; there are issues of availability of the broadband to everyone in India. So there are larger issues in this situation. But on the specific issue of pricing, so long as the pricing discounts are singular, in the sense that they are across all networks equally, there should be no problem, because they don't violate this basic principle of decoupling of the networks from the content, and that is precisely what we have said. We have dealt with the issue of net neutrality from a tariff perspective. We are saying that there should be no differential tariff on the basis of the origin or the destination or the content and that's basically the whole argument. So long as any model, which does not violate this principle, we will be absolutely happy to work with anybody. We are in fact bringing this out, because we had asked that question in the consultation paper also. We had said that differential pricing is one part but we had said whether there are any other models available with which can facilitate the availability of free data? And now we are actually working out on various architectures to ensure that there actually are models available which can actually provide the free data irrespective of the pipe with which you approach that data.

NDTV: Again one of the hypes around this whole issue was that we had a number of startup founders saying. Paytm founders saying that this is about the colonizing the Internet and India is not third world and digital at all and why should we be colonized? Do you agree with that fight at all because the Facebook board member came and said, oh what's wrong with colonizing and he got into trouble? Do you agree with that analogy of colonizing the Internet?

RS Sharma: Sonia, I will not go into those kinds of debates. Let me just give you one example of what differential pricing consequence, just one simple example. If you allow differential pricing, it will mean that the telecom service provider can actually differentially price that various websites. Now let's take the example of banking, some telecom service providers have also got the payment licence also recently. So there is a bank also which has got a telecom service provider as its owner or its partner or whatever. There are other banks like Indiapost, now Indiapost does not have a telecom service provider. What the TSP's can do, if you go to my bank and as you know banking today is all Internet, all online, if you go to especially the rural areas between the micro ATM's and the biometric authenticated banking systems, if you go to my bank I will not charge you any money. But if you go to the other bank, Indiapost for example, I'll charge you 10 times the price. So obviously you are in a way creating a situation in which you are promoting your own bank and actually ensuring that nobody visits the other bank. Which is essentially, then these startups or you know the small guys who put up a website, they will you know be at a disadvantage, because the larger players or the players who have got a tie up with a TSP will be able to have access and they will have an advantage compared to the other guy's startups.

NDTV: Mr Sharma you clearly seem to like taking on powerful corporates, because your current battle is with India's cell phone operators who seem to say that they should not be made to pay the customer for call drops. Why have you taken on this battle? This is all in 6 months.

RS Sharma: I don't know whether you would like to call it a battle. Essentially what we are doing is, as a regulator our job is to ensure a balance of interest of all these stakeholders and in the telecom world; the stakeholders are obviously the TSP's, the government and the people. And what we are trying to do is to ensure a quality of service to the telecom consumers and that some people may see it as anti-industry or therefore taking on this lobby or anything like that. But I don't see it that way. I always tell my telecom service provider friends that don't consider this as something, which is an adversarial relationship. Essentially consider this, that as a regulator we are trying to do our job to ensure that the people who pay for the services, they have a right to get good services and if there is a deficiency in services, that should be compensated. And what we have done recently is essentially a very notional sense of compensation. We have issued and of course the matter is sub judice so I'll not like to elaborate on that, but essentially this is not really a battle, but it is the role we are playing as regulators.

NDTV: Interestingly of course the courts have upheld your order so far but the matter is sub judice. But just to ask, the industry's point of view is that this is not entirely fair, because the call drops are not because of what they're doing, but because of the infrastructure they are getting, so they are saying they're victims and yet they're being made to pay.

RS Sharma: Well let me not really delve on that because those arguments have been made in the court of law, honourable High Court of Delhi and counter arguments were made by TRAI and the order has come and you must have gone through that order, so I don't think I should really revisit those issues, because whose fault it is and all those issues have been dealt with.

NDTV: The larger principle of accountability is an interesting one; you do feel as a regulator, accountability of services should be given?
 
RS Sharma: Absolutely, I feel that. One of the arguments which was made was that if we are meeting the benchmarks or 2% call drops then there is no reason for, you know, compensating call drops and the basic principle is that while you can have the industry benchmarks, now does that extinguish the right of the individual consumer to seek redress if there is a deficiency in service? That's basically the issue and the honourable Court has upheld that. Indeed both these things are not necessarily contradictory.

NDTV: What do you all feel? Do you think that telecom service providers should be made to pay for call drops? Do you feel that that's a valid argument? I think you'll find that none of the people who use cell phones will actually argue with what you're saying Sir. But on that controversial point of infrastructure, when you look at what's being provided right now, one issue has been of spectrum. How much spectrum is available, how it's actually being distributed, how are you as regulator looking at that?
 
RS Sharma: See the recent recommendation which the TRAI has sent to the government has said that whatever spectrum is available should be auctioned. So that part is there. So we are and earlier also the TRAI has made recommendations to the government that whatever spectrum can be made available for commercial use should be made available and that is the general principle which TRAI has consistently been adopting. That we should make more and more spectrum available and the recent recommendations are actually a step in that direction.

NDTV: But can the government be more proactive on this? We're talking about 4G etc, with infrastructure issues, are these actually going to provide value to the customer?
 
RS Sharma: Of course. We are also working, I would not like to comment on the other issue, but we are working on the issue of how we can optimize the spectrum usage. Spectrum audit for example, we have sent the government a recommendation that whichever Department has got the spectrum, that how this is being used should also be probably be looked into.

NDTV: This whole issue of defence and spectrum that the Defence Ministry holds has been one issue as well.
 
RS Sharma: Let me not get into specific departments. But overall spectrum is a perishable resource. In mines if you have coal or any other mineral you may decide I may not mine it today, I will mine it tomorrow, but in spectrum if you do not use it today you cannot use it tomorrow, because it is not an accumulative commodity and therefore it is necessary, whatever spectrum we have got, we must optimally use it. That is in the national interest. And to ensure that we decided to have some mechanism to audit its usage by various agencies who hold spectrum.

NDTV: Broadband penetration has been another issue because when we talk about digital India and look at the revolution without much broadband penetration, nothing can happen and in the recent years we have been falling behind. How can we fix that?

RS Sharma: I couldn't agree with you more that the entire success of Digital India is making available the broadband connectivity to the people as a utility to the citizens. Digital India programme has broadly three components. One is digital infrastructure; another is software and services on demand and third is citizen empowerment. Another point to be mentioned is that we have 10 crore digital cable TV's in this country. Each of these cable TVs is capable of carrying data and somehow if we can create a good eco system to ensure that digital TV's can provide Internet access also, it will do a lot of things. 50 crore people in this country will have a 10mbps connectivity provided in their homes. It will also release a lot of pressure on the spectrum because currently what is used is the wireless telephone to access Internet you are actually using some part of spectrum. Congestion levels will go down. It is a completely win, win situation. We have given recommendations to the government and I'm aware that the government is working very actively to provide this option also. So we are working on multiple options to increase broadband penetrations in the country.

NDTV: Let's throw some questions at the audience.
 
Questioner 1:  The radiation levels in today's world is fuming high so we cannot live without a mobile phone, without social media, but it has a very harmful effect on our bodies. So is TRAI having any kind of plans for environmental friendly technologies for present and future generations?

NDTV: So scared of radiation towers that nobody wants it in their colonies anymore.
 
RS Sharma: There are thousands of studies carried across the world and there is not even a single study, which says that mobile towers are a health hazard. Radiation is of 2 types. Broadly one is an ionising radiation, which can throw away electrons from an atom and another one is the normal radio waves. Unfortunately because of the mobile towers it is called radius, it is nothing but radio waves and fall in the category of non-ionising radio waves. It is the same kind, which comes out of your television, so this is not really radiation in that sense. So unnecessary scare has been created and of course there may be many reasons for it and I do not want to go into that. I would go to the other part. If the tower is not near you, your mobile phone is shouting to reach the tower, because the signal is low and also that radiation is not harmful. But nevertheless the exposure to so-called radiation, that is completely harmless that radiation is more in case you do not have a tower. This whole theory of mobile towers causing radiations and health hazards is a completely misplaced theory

Questioner 2: TRAI has refused the idea of Free Basics by Zuckerberg. Here I am thinking if I buy freedom 251 where will I have Internet to use it? When will TRAI come with a solid concrete idea of providing free Internet to the poor, students of this country? Is TRAI working on this issue or not?
 
RS Sharma: I have no issue to join on the idea of Free Basics. We are not against any idea to provide free data to the people. We certainly oppose the idea of discriminatory pricing of data based on content and how in a practical situation you can effectively censor websites and make it inaccessible and therefore this idea is not opposing. Nevertheless, I completely concede your point and thus providing broadband, as utility to the people at a very affordable price, is certainly something, which we must work towards it. Unfortunately we must understand the issues. In USA 50% of the people access Internet in their homes using their telephone lines. The total number of wired lines in this country is less than 2 crores. So we do not have a situation where people can access Internet through wired lines. That is why TRAI gave the idea of providing wired cable TV lines to access Internet. So we may have missed out that part, we have to work through whatever is available. We should use all resources and methods. It can be satellites, TV white spaces, Bharat Net programme to give connectivity. Everything should be pooled together to provide broadband connectivity. And ultimately affordability is also an issue. We are all for affordable prices, free access to data, as long as it is done in a manner which does not violate the basic principles of difference in tariff.

NDTV: We are talking so much about your current role but they do not know about your previous role. This week is a crucial week because in the Parliament finally Aadhar is being introduced as a money bill. How did you get to Aadhar? Everyone praising it, how do you feel?

RS Sharma: Absolutely fantastic what is happening and the very fact, that by the end of this month we are going to have 1 billion Aadhars. It is a huge achievement and India is in a unique position to have such a huge digital infrastructure and this identity is transformational. Because it does two things; it cleans up the entire delivery system by eliminating duplicates and back of the envelope we estimated one can save as much as 50,000 crore rupees per annum. The entire cost of Aadhar is less than 10,000 crore. So you have a scheme of saving 50,000 crore per annum and a total investment of 10,000 crores in a period of 7 years, so it's huge. And secondly it provides a digital online authentication system, which does a whole lot of transactions

NDTV: You're an unusual bureaucrat, you did not mind being a part of the process, it was just an ambitious idea, many thought that it was just a pipe dream and then we had a change in the government and many people on this government opposed it very strongly. So did you think then that Aadhar was dead?
 
RS Sharma: On a personal level I did think that it will suffer a setback. I must say that this government has leveraged it to a beautiful extent. The Honourable PM said that we have saved 15,000 crore rupees in a single year in the LPG transfer. It is a huge achievement. I feel so good that this has happened.

NDTV: Nandan Nilekani wrote in his book that Ram Sharma we had to get the code ready and he rolled up his sleeve and said I work the whole weekend and I will do the programming code myself. That's rare.

RS Sharma: Programming happens to be my hobby and I must tell you that I purchased my first computer in 1985, when I was a District Magistrate of Begusarai. Many of you must have heard...

NDTV: Kanhaiya Kumar is from Begusarai.

RS Sharma: In those days there were no hard disks, there used to be a big floppy disk of six and a half inches and we did a programme on firearms. Begusarai was a place where there was huge crime rate, so we did a programme on lost and found firearms. That's where I started programming and then it came handy when I did Aadhar.

NDTV: I have to say that it has been a fascinating journey for you because in the first 6 months you have set things on fire and we wish you all the best and thank you for being on The Dialogues this evening.

RS Sharma: Thank you very much for having me here. It was a pleasure talking to you and all the young minds and people.

NDTV: Thank you Sir.