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"It is indeed shocking to observe that India remains the
only country in the world, which has no law whatsoever to regulate
satellite broadcasting," a memorandum, submitted by three cable
organisations to the Prime Minister, infobroad minister Jaipal Reddy
and Telecom Regulatory Authority of India chief Pradip Baijal, states.
The text of the memorandum was released to the media here today.
It further states: "Taking full advantage of the complete lawless
state of affairs, the satellite broadcasters have unleashed a spate
of unfair, unjustified and monopolistic practices over the hapless
consumers and cable operators in order to fulfill their devious objectives."
The signatories to the memorandum have pointed that broadcasters,
especially the two big ones, "abused their position" to
reverse government and court orders on conditional access system
(CAS) "in spite of the fact that implementation of CAS was
in the public interest and that Rs 8000 million had already been
invested in setting up the infrastructure" for addressability.
The signatories to the memorandum, which attempts at reverting attention
on the broadcast and cable sector, include Cable Operators Federation
of India, Cable Networks Association of India and National Cable
& Telecom Association.
On monopolistic tendencies prevalent in the sector, the memorandum
says that most broadcasters are selling their channels as bundles/
bouquets without giving the right to the consumers to choose individual
channels of choice. "To make matters worse, pay channel pricing
has been used as a predatory tool to eliminate competition on the
ground," the memo states.
DTH too has come under the cable operators' scanner and it has
been alleged that, while all forms of competition are welcome, the
cable operators fear that the broadcasters will deny a level playing
field by initially subsidizing the content on DTH and making it
more expensive on cable, leading to wholesale destruction of the
cable TV industry which could lead to an unemployment problem in
the country.
Making all the right political noises, the petitioners have said
that 70,000 cable operators of India provided employment to 1,500,000
individuals and the government should ensure that they are "not
driven out of their occupation by coercive tactics of foreign broadcasters."
The 'trap' system or poor man's set-top box for addressability
too hasn't been spared. Nor the Trai, which has been accused of
playing favourite.
Pointing out that the 'trap' is an "obsolete technology,
rejected the world over two decades ago, "Trai has been criticised
for pushing this obsolete technology with the objective of "putting
the cable industry at a technological disadvantage as compared to
DTH and broadband."
After all this, the demands: immediate enactment of a broadcasting
legislation on the lines of the Draft Broadcast Bill of 1997; implementation
of CAS; ensuring pay channels are not sold as bouquets; guidelines
on restricting advertisement time on pay channels and increasing
the basic cable service charges from Rs 72 (excluding taxes) to
Rs 180 (excluding local taxes).
Doesn't all this sound a bit too familiar?
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