The Hindu Business Line : New guidelines for uplinking — TV 18 seeks clarifications on `public shareholding'

Television Eighteen (TV 18), which owns CNBC-TV 18, has sought clarifications from the Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry on how the public shareholding of the company would be treated in the wake of the new regulations stipulating the need for a dominant Indian shareholder.

According to the recently revised norms, permission would be granted only to those cases where equity held by the largest Indian shareholder is at least 51 per cent of the total equity. However, in the case of TV 18, the Indian promoters hold just 24.52 per cent while the public holds a higher 31.53 per cent. Domestic financial institutions, banks and mutual funds hold about 12.61 per cent, private corporate bodies hold 6.42 per cent while foreign institutional investors (FIIs) hold about 8.14 per cent.

Officials in TV 18 said that the company has sought clarification from the Government on how the public shareholding would be treated. "We are a widely held company with Mr Raghav Bahl having management and controlling interest. But we want to know how the public shareholding will be treated," said a top company official.

Sources in the Ministry while acknowledging that they have received queries from the company, said that a view would be soon taken on the issue.

Also, the company has investment by FIIs, which is not permitted in either news and current affairs publications or in news channels.

TV 18 had last month hived off the channel's operations into its existing unlisted subsidiary - iNews.com Ltd - and CNBC AP had taken a 10 per cent stake in this India registered entity. The increase in stake has been virtually cash neutral for TV18 and the agreement with CNBC also included a definitive 15-year franchise arrangement for the CNBC brand.

But with the new norms in place, the Government has also asked the business news channel to comply with the revised norms. Company officials have already assured the I&B Ministry that it would follow the change in the entry criteria.

The Government decided to alter the rules after it felt that the application put forward by Star News violated the existing guidelines in `spirit'.

Also, there was a demand to bring the regulations for news channels at par with norms for foreign investment in news and current affairs publications.

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