The Supreme Court on Thursday accepted the plea of Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) for regular hearing filed against the Lahore High Court's stay order on the bidding process for Direct-to-Home (DTH) licence in the country. A five-member larger bench led by Justice Gulzar Ahmed and comprising Justice Mushir Alam, Justice Sardar Tariq Masood, Justice Mazhar Alam Khan Miankhel and Justice Sajjad Ali Shah granted Pemra's leave to appeal in the matter.
Earlier, the apex court had vacated the LHC stay of November 22 on bidding process for DTH licence with directives to Pemra that it will not grant licence to successful bidder till final determination of the matter pending before the LHC. During the course of proceedings on Thursday, the counsel for Pemra contended before the larger bench that his client is determined to break monopoly of one group in DTH licensing in the country in order to provide better services to viewers.
He apprised the bench that prevailing laws permit to grant licences for four satellite channels, four FM radios and for two landing rights licences, saying a broadcaster cannot become a distributor in accordance with the law. The Pemra counsel requested the court to avoid from allowing a private channel from issuing licence in the matter, saying there are a total of 120 television channels in the country from which ten channels have their monopoly, adding some channels should not be allowed to pave way in making public opinion.
After hearing preliminary arguments of the Pemra counsel in the matter, the larger bench accepted the Authority' appeal for regular hearing and asked the fixation branch to club the appeals in the matter. Later, the hearing of matter was adjourned for indefinite period.
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