Since Free Basics would only be providing access for Facebook’s pre-approved list of sites, putting the rest behind a paywall, many critics believe the service to violate net neutrality, as well as mask an possible ulterior motive for Facebook.
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The executives said in the letter, dated Tuesday, that differential pricing for Internet access would lead to a “few players like Facebook with its Free Basics platform acting as gate-keepers”.
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Earlier this month, Trai had asked Reliance Communications to keep Free Basics in abeyance till the issue on differential pricing is sorted out. In a statement the agency says the comments do not in any way address specific questions raised by net neutrality advocates. “Now how supporting Free Basics help in answering the questions…it has become hard for us to arrive at”, Sharma said.
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A Facebook spokesman said the aim of the Free Basics initiative was to give people a taste of what the internet can offer. “To all those whom we can approach, we will try to reach them”, Sharma said. Sharma said although these comments are also in a template form but the template answers all the questions with minor variations so there is no need to write back to them.
He said the regulator has received only 3.81 lakh comments from people claiming supporters of net neutrality.
“We will ask them to provide logical answers to those questions of Consultation Paper so that we can publish their comments on January 7”.
The date has been extended at a time when social network Facebook has launched a massive campaign in support of its Free Basics Internet service, which has been dubbed in various quarters as violative of the principle of net neutrality.
It would therefore put the small providers of content as well as the startups that do not participate at a big disadvantage.
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India’s telecom regulator has received over 14 lakh responses in support of Facebook’s contentious Free Basics platform, but virtually all were redundant for formulating a policy as the regulator had sought views on the principle of differential pricing for data services, not the Free Basics initiative per se. Such was the case for India, the only other country so far to have put down a freeze on the program alongside Egypt.
