Telecom Regulatory of India (TRAI) will be floating a consultation paper on the issue of the converging technological environment because it reckons that in such an environment, it is not in the interest of a sector to be handled by different ministries.
The regulator has made recommendations to improve the data centre infrastructure in the country.
TRAI has argued that the policy aspects of data centres, content delivery networks, and Internet exchange points should be handled by Digital Communication Commission (DCC), a department under Department of Telecommunication (DoT).
Digital communication
“As per allocation of business rules, ‘data’ is allocated to DoT, but , policies related to DCs are being handled by MeitY. The Authority is of the opinion that data centres, content delivery networks and Internet exchange points (IXPs) are integral components of “digital communication infrastructure and services,” said TRAI.
Need apex body
In the same recommendation paper for data centres, TRAI also suggested the formation of the Data Digitisation and Monetisation Council (DDMC), an apex body to oversee all issues related to data digitisation, data sharing and data monetisation in the country. This recommendation has come even as the PDP Bill under MeitY proposed to set up a new data protection board.
This comes at a time when the Ministry of Communications is setting out to regulate various areas that usually come under the purview of the Ministry of Electronics and IT. In the Draft Telecom Bill 2022, the DoT has proposed that communication OTTs such as WhatsApp and Signal come under telecommunication services classification.