The inter-ministerial group on foreign direct investment in the broadcasting sector will consider a proposal that an Indian should be the dominant partner in a news venture.
According to the proposal, Indian shareholding in a news broadcasting company should not be dispersed and the single largest Indian shareholder must hold more than 26 per cent in the company to ensure that management control remains with an Indian.
"In a news operation, management control should be with the Indian shareholder. A dispersed shareholding of Indian players does not allow this. We had to take care of this in the policy regarding FDI in print. We may do the same in the case of broadcasting," said a government official.
The group will look into the various aspects of FDI in broadcasting, particularly in the genre of news, to prevent any violation of uplinking norms and to plug any possible loopholes in the law. It will also look into issues related to cross-holdings in various media sectors.
The group has been set up to revisit and revise the four-month-old uplinking regulation to ensure that rules are not violated and companies adhere to the 26 per cent foreign equity cap.
The decision to review the uplinking policy was decided at a meeting attended by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha, Law Minister Arun Jaitley, National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra and Information and Broadcasting Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
The high-powered group will have representation from the information and broadcasting ministry as well as other ministries like law, company affairs, finance and home.
It was decided that consultations will be held among these ministries to revise the guidelines to ensure strict compliance of the foreign equity clause by channels "in letter and spirit".
