Recently, the Supreme Court asked the Centre on the measures it plans to take to regulate content on over-the-top (OTT) video streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.
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A bench headed by the Chief Justice of India asked the government to submit a reply to the public interest litigation (PIL) filed by advocate Shashank Shekhar Jha seeking the establishment of an autonomous body to regulate web shows and films. Last month, the SC had also asked the Centre, Amazon Prime Video and Excel Entertainment to respond to a plea alleging that the Mirzapur web series had tarnished the image of Mirzapur by depicting it as a city of goons.
It’s not difficult to see why. There are enough court cases and FIRs against several web series. FIRs were registered against the makers of political thriller Tandav, which was released on Amazon Prime Video. Eventually, the information and broadcasting ministry, the administrative ministry for OTT platforms since November 2020, intervened and the director agreed to apologize and make changes to the alleged offensive scenes.
In 2019, Netflix was also in the crosshairs of political parties which had complained against series such as Leila and Sacred Games. That the Centre intends to regulate streaming platforms was evident from I&B minister Prakash Javadekar’s statement in the Rajya Sabha earlier this month. In a brief submission, he said that guidelines were almost ready and will be implemented soon.
Suggestions include creating a vertical under CBFC to handle OTT content. Some are of the view that streaming platform regulation should scan programming through three separate lenses: related to children and women, sex and violence, and defence and security forces.
However, for now, CBFC is ill-equipped to handle such a vast mandate owing to paucity of infrastructure.
Besides, the government, too, is not keen on pre-censorship of content. It is in the favour of age-appropriate classification by platforms, among other things. It is also veering towards a Singapore-like model, which functions under the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA). As per its regulation, service providers are required to obtain a licence, classify content on their platforms, display ratings and content descriptors and spell out the prohibited content.
Also, much like the Singapore rules, the Indian government is keen to introduce penalties for code violation.
Even as the government is mulling its options, 17 of India’s largest streaming services hurriedly signed a self-regulation toolkit under the aegis of the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI). The signatories said they have included government suggestions after their first content code was rejected by the ministry in September 2020.
Despite prodding from the government, the video streaming services could not come up with a unanimously acceptable code for two years. And when they did, the government found a two-tier complaints redressal mechanism missing.
Recently, the platforms said they had incorporated the suggested changes. They have identified the prohibited content, mentioned the applicable laws on paper and made provision for a two-tier system.
To be sure, the original draft did have a provision for an external body headed by a retired judge to look into complaints that were escalated. This was not acceptable to a majority of platforms.
Their latest attempt at including a second tier is an ombudsman, which allows for two members from the company and one external member, to look into complaints. It’s not clear if this independent member will have veto power.
All eyes, meanwhile, are on the government and its emissary to come up with something that balances creative freedom with a viable regulatory code.
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Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.