Telecommunications : Leaving Licensing Folly Behind

Leaving Licensing Folly Behind The decision of the group of ministers on telecom to switch to unified licences for mobile services is welcome, although the unification envisaged remains partial. True unification of telecom services, one that dovetails into the new technological paradigm of convergence of communications, is still far away. Long distance communication is conceived of as needing a separate licence, to retain the division of the national market into multiple circles. Under the kind of unification envisaged in the Convergent Communications Bill languishing in parliament, not only the present segmentation of the national market into separate service areas, but also that of telecom and broadcasting and the further segmentation of telecom services under different licences would disappear.