| "The finance ministry has agreed to
our request of extending the deadline for reduction of import duties
on set top boxes till 30 September," an official of the information
and broadcasting ministry said today, pointing out that a notification
to this effect would be issued either today or tomorrow.
Fazed by criticism on lack of availability of boxes even while
going ahead with conditional access system (CAS) rollout earlier
this year, the government had reduced import duties on set top boxes
to 5 per cent from about 52 per cent with an aim to give fillip
to imports.
With pressure mounting from all sides, the government has now further
extended the tax sop.
A few days back, in reply to a query from a fellow parliamentarian,
I & B minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had said that, as per data
available with the government, slightly over 50,000 boxes had been
cleared by the customs till 16 July.
Today, the government official pointed out that though they don't
have an exact fix on the number of boxes as of Monday, the feedback
from the industry, including multi-system operators, is that 200,000
STBs are in the country.
The government also has directed the broadcasters to give their
final pricing and details of the incentives and promotional activities
leading up to CAS rollout.
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