I am writing to express my strong views in favour of net neutrality, after reading your consultation document at https://www.trai.gov.in/WriteReaddata/ConsultationPaper/Document/OTT-CP-27032015.pdf. 

Firstly, I want to appreciate that you are opening the dialogue to public, the users of internet, and want to include various viewpoints in your policy.

This debate is not new to India, and wherever it has been raised (Netherlands- where it was revoked; USA - where it has been strongly opposed), people have spoken out strongly against the destruction of net neutrality by telecom companies, who shall be the sole bodies profited. From reading the paper, I gather that the strongest argument telecom companies have against net neutrality is that their call/SMS revenues have dropped, and that the infrastructure they have laid out has enabled value added services for which they do not receive an additional surcharge. This gripe is absurd on many counts:

1. If the telecom companies are providing data at a loss, it is possible to raise the cost of internet/data usage (on mobile devices) to make up for revenue losses. They offer their current prices to remain competitive in the increasingly crowded market of ISPs. This is good for the customer and is the norm in any industry - there is no reason to partially support telecom industries alone.

2. Yes, value added services are possible on the internet today - but that is no different from any infrastructure or new mode of communication. When any mode of communication is enabled and neutral in allowing access to third party service providers, it enables building new enterprises. You cannot be charged more to call a grocer in your neighbourhood, over your next-door neighbour, simply because the former is using telephones to take business orders. The power of telephone and mobile lie in the business they enable, and it is because of need for such businesses that people for telecom services. If I couldn't access any website of my choice for the same rate, I would never pay for the internet. The fact that consumers use Uber/Ola/Facebook/Skype is shown as somehow hurtful to broadband/internet service providers; in fact it is the reverse, today everybody buys mobile data plans because they want to use Whatsapp/Skype/Ola/whatever else.

3. In light of 2, if telecom companies cannot think of a way to increase profitability from data provision (while their revenues are continuously increasing!) , they cannot penalise the consumer for it. If they wish to keep last millennium technology such as calling and SMSing earning at par with internet revenues, they can lower the costs of calling and SMSing.

4. Choosing instead to monopolise the internet by charging preferential rate is an absurd way to hack the free market.

I also want to stress how free and neutral access to the internet has powered big and small enterprises today. I work in an agricultural services provider company,which works as a trust - takes donations, raises grants - and provides cheap technology services to farmers (www.magasool.org) in Tamilnadu. We raise awareness through the internet and social media and are able to reach a wide range of interested donors, we are able to keep our functioning transparent, and surprisingly, we are able to advertise for our services on free information portals. Our employees (rural agricultural farm labour and farmers) work with us to produce vermicompost and processed millets (our first few services). We advertise for these on the internet, using social media, and other free sites, and we get a surprising volume of calls from remote parts of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh/Karnataka, placing orders. The profits help farmers and farm help directly and without the internet being neutral to enterprises such as ours,we would have never found half the conviction to be a business model. The internet does not only help well funded, rich, and upscale entrepreneurs such as Ola, Flipkart, and others - but equally make news possible (equally being key!) small enterprises, and brave new ideas. Communication and connectivity are just tools - any body may use them; mobile applications providing value added services may have found the first way to be profitable, but there are others in lesser known sectors such as agriculture, and other parts of the rural economy that use it to the fullest.

I hope there will be many more letters you shall receive with similar views. Once again, I thank you for opening the debate to the public, and reiterate my strong support in favour of net neutrality. Please allow everybody free and neutral access to connectivity, it is a fundamental driver of growth and enterprise.

Thank you ,

Sincere regards,

Aruna