Like Australia, India should enact law to make tech giants pay for news content: Sushil Modi

Former Bihar deputy CM Sushil Modi (File photo)

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Rajya Sabha member Sushil Modi on March 18 told CNN-News18 that he has urged the Centre to enact laws that will make technology companies pay for displaying news reports.

Talking to CNN-News18, the former deputy chief minister of Bihar said: “The media industry invests a huge amount of money for their reporters, correspondents and various equipment. It has been disseminating credible news yet Google ends up earning the profits.”

“In Australia, the government has asked these tech giants to pay for the news content they have been using freely. It was not easy, though. They are super monopolies and big companies, yet, Australia did it,” he told the news channel.

“The Indian media is facing a major financial crisis because of the loss of revenue and pandemic and I have asked the government to enact laws to make these tech giants pay for news,” he added.

The Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament (MP) also said that he was planning to write to the Information and Broadcasting Ministry regarding the same.

Raising the issue through a Zero Hour mention in Parliament on March 17, Sushil Modi had said, "The government must make Google, Facebook and YouTube pay print and news channels for the news content they are using freely."

"I would urge the government of India that the way they have notified Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code to regulate social media and OTT platforms, they should enact a law on the pattern of Australian Code so that we can compel Google to share its revenue with traditional media," he had said in the Upper House.

Rajya Sabha Chairman and Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu remarked that the suggestion is "worth considering".

The traditional news media, Sushil Modi said, makes heavy investments employing anchors, journalists and reporters who gather information, verify it and deliver credible news. But advertisement, which is their main source of revenue, has in the past few years shifted away from them with the advent of tech giants like Google, Facebook and YouTube, he said.

"Advertising earnings are going to these tech giants (and) because of this print media, news channels are passing through a financial crisis," Modi said.

"I would urge [that] we should follow a country like Australia which has taken the lead by enacting a law -- News Media Bargaining Code -- by which they have compelled Google to share advertisement revenue with the news media," he said.

Google threatened to blackout news from its portal but ultimately surrendered, the BJP leader said. "Australia has set precedence and now France and other European countries are making laws for advertisement revenue sharing."