| In
a meeting today chaired by Karunanidhi and
attended by Electricity minister Arcot N Veerasamy,
chief secretary L K Tripathi and other officials,
it was decided that the cable TV service would
be offered through a state government undertaking.
Various
options are being explored including that
of Elcot, a state nodal agency for information
and communication technology projects, or
of the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board for
providing cable connections to households
in the state.
The
cabinet will meet on 11 August to take a
final call on what would be the best route
to take.
The
decision to run cable TV operations comes
in the backdrop of a split between former
Union minister for communications and IT
Dayanidhi Maran and Karunanidhi over a survey
conducted by Sun Group owned newspaper Dinakaran
over the popularity of the chief minister's
sons.
Karunanidhi's
family is also launching Kalaignar TV and
would need support from cable networks for
carrying the channel.
Karunanidhi
has, however, made it clear that the state
government would not take over cable networks.
It would rather run its own cable TV.
This
is in sharp contrast to the previous Jayalalitha
government's stance which had passed the
Tamil Nadu Acquisition, Transfer and Taking
Over of the Administration of Cable Television
Network (Including Multiple Service Optical
Transport System) Bill in January 2006 to
take over operations of multi-system operators
(MSOs). However, it never saw the light
of the day and in 2006 the Tamil Nadu Governor
had sent back the Bill pointing out that
the relevant powers vested with the centre.
The DMK government, which came to power,
subsequently withdrew the Bill.
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