More Regulations or Better Regulators?

When I had my 1st gprs enabled mobile phone, there was a dedicated 'Internet' button in it, which gets frequently pressed by accident. And each time the button is pressed, a certain amount is deducted from my account towards data charges, even though less than 5KB of data was transferred. Also, by default, focus is set to some expensive downloads like Games/Wallpapers (approx. Rs30/-) in the home page. So if we accidentally pressed 'I' button twice a reasonable amount will be deducted from our account.

If someone went to complain about this to the telecom czar, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India(TRAI) we know what would be the response!

Now, a similar situation occurred in USA. Verizon mobile was accused of charging its customers around $1.99 for a single click of 'I' button even if negligible data is transfered. Though Verizon denied it early, once FCC (american counterpart of TRAI) started a formal investigation into this, they yielded and started refunding customers' money to avoid penalty. The total amount is a whopping $90million. (roughly 450crores INR)

This clearly shows how weak our regulators are. India arguably has the best rules & regulations in the world, but when it comes to execution we lags by a mile!

Another similar incident is the notorious bhopal disaster- for thousands of lost lives, court punished the company a few thousand dollars, but BP was fined billions of dollars for killing few fishes in gulf oil spill!

Like someone aptly said "We dont need more regulations, we need better regulators"

A related post: http://cijothomasindia.blogspot.com/2010/07/me-and-indian-telecom-players.html