Star shuts feeds to IN Cable in Mumbai; MSO says it has moved
court
(Posted on 11 June, 9:30 pm)
Star India this evening switched off all its feeds to IN Cable
in Mumbai city over what it said were unpaid payments going back
three months and a massive under-declaration of its subscriber
base on the part of the multi-systems operator (MSO). IN Cable
on its part claimed it had filed a court case against what it
termed were "predatory practices" by broadcasters.
IN Cable CEO Ram Hingorani said that Star, ESPN and AXN - the
action channel from the Sony Entertainment Television's stable
- had all ganged up and formed a cartel against it. Hingorani
alleged that SET India has also switched off its AXN decoders
in the IN Cable headends but Sony officials could not be contacted
for details at the time of posting this report.
According to Yash Khanna, Star's corporate communications head,
the shut-off was the culmination of a long-standing dispute with
IN Cable over its declared connectivity. "IN Cable claims 1.5
million subscribers when chasing advertising, but when they come
back to us they say the figure is less than 150,000. That's not
even 10 per cent of their actual subscriber base," Khanna pointed
out.
There is also the issue of nonpayment of dues, Khanna said.
"IN Cable has been seeking more time to pay its dues for the last
three months now. We decided that enough was enough," he added.
The shutoff comes close on the heels of the blanking out of
sports channels, ESPN and Star Sports, by the ESPN-Star Sports
management following a tussle over subscription bases on 7 June.
The shutoff had caused a lot of consternation among viewers because
it happened just before the start of the India-Zimbabwe Test cricket
series.
During the recently held England-Pakistan one-day series, ESPN-Star
Sports went to the extent of announcing that any subscriber of
IN Cablenet watching the transmission of the match was doing something
illegal as it was a pirated signal and an act such as this was
liable for penal action.
This hasn't prevented local sub-ops affiliated to IN Cable
from stealing the ESPN Star Sports signal though, from other cable
operators.
Hingorani could not be reached later for more details on his
version of the events despite repeated attempts. Apparently, he
is scheduled to meet with the Star distribution team to sort out
the issue tomorrow morning.
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