MUMBAI: The Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) has welcomed the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (TRAI) decision to rule out differential pricing.

“The broadcasting industry is appreciative of TRAI’s decision to rule out differential pricing. IBF has earlier opposed differential pricing terming it to be ‘non-competitive,” said IBF secretary general Girish Srivastava.

In its response to the consultation paper, IBF had clearly stated that such discriminatory entry barriers would lead to “reduced scope of consumer choice, inducing artificial scarcity.”

“In our opinion, TRAI’s regulation on prohibiting differential pricing constitutes a milestone as it was against the basic principle of Internet access as no private player should have the power and right to decide which information can be accessed and which is less easily available,” Srivastava added.

As was reported earlier by Indiantelevision.com, major broadcasters like Star India, Sony Pictures Networks India and Zee Network submitted their comments to TRAI in favour of net neutrality citing the drawbacks of differential pricing for telecom services.