CAS, consumers confusion confounded as concessions come in

NEW DELHI, Jun 2 (UNI) The CAS-weary consumer in the four metros is a confused person today.

Even as he is still to understand how the Conditional Access Systems(CAS) for cable network work and what they imply, announcements have come from Multi-Service Operators (MSOs) offering Set Top-Boxes (STBs) on rent or lower rates following the decision to temporarily reduce customs duty on imported boxes.

While information and broadcasting minister Ravi Shankar Prasad keeps insisting that deadline of July 14 will be adhered to, it is clear that opposition to introduction of CAS continues, with senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders, including president M Venkiah Naidu and general secretary Pramod Mahajan, meeting deputy prime minister L K Advani, and party spokesman Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi admitting the party would not like to rake up another issue on the eve of state assembly elections.

In addition, the Congress has taken a clear stand against this haste to introduce CAS with party spokesman S.Jaipal Reddy and Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit calling for a deferment, a demand made separately by a majority of the members of the parliamentary standing committee on information technology, headed by senior marxist member Somnath Chatterjee.

Adding to this confusion is the allegation by Delhi Shiv Sena, which supports CAS, that Dikshit and BJP leader Madan Lal Khurana were playing politics.

While cable operators are strongly supportive of CAS and have even threatened to raise their rates to Rs 450 if it is not implemented, the average viewer is still ignorant of the Free-To-Air (FTA) channels, besides Doordarshan, that will be available to him even without an STB for the fee of Rs 72 plus local taxes (which will raise the amount to Rs 97 in Delhi) fixed by the centre.

Apart from this, it appears that most broadcasters want to offer bouquets instead of individual channels, while the government is delaying its decision on unbundling of bouquets and pricing of channels.

However, Prasad claims that the law is clear that there should be a fair mix of all genres in the FTA channels, inclusive of three Doordarshan channels, and the cable operator cannot make any arbitrary selection.

In the case of violation, the law provides for arrest without warrant.

Sources in the broadcasting industry told UNI that in the event of unbundling of channels, the cost of all the pay channels comes to Rs 223.

Of these, choice pay channels per consumer on an average will not be more than Rs 150.

Therefore, the total of FTA and pay channels will not be more than Rs 250.

MSOs have announced several packages ranging between 60 paise to Rs one per day for renting STBs.

While the Zee TV-owned Siticable said it would offer digital STBs at the rate of Rs 2750 exclusive of local taxes or for Rs sixty paise per day on a rental scheme, the Hinduja-owned Incablenet said digital STBs will be available at a refundable deposit of Rs 999 plus a nominal daily rent of Re one.

The pay TV services will be provided under the brand name of "Indigital" and will be available to its cable TV subscribers.

Hathway has offered two schemes, a refundable deposit of Rs 999 and daily rental of Rs one as an `early bird scheme', or a refundable deposit of Rs 2600 and a daily rental charge of 60 paise.

While the cable operators have urged the Delhi chief minister to reduce the local duties and taxes, the Consumer Coordination Council says various issues like the availability of STBs, their local production, the reason why the customs duty cut is only till July 31 even when local STBs are not available, who will install the STBs and offer guarantees, and what will happen when other technologies like fibre optics and Direct-To-Home (DTH) come into play.

The work on CAS began in September 2001, when the then minister Sushma Swaraj announced the decision to set up a task force to review the demands of operators to implement the Conditional Access System in the country.

This was generally because the broadcasters blamed the cable operators for under-reporting the number of subscribers resulting in loss of revenue to the broadcasters and also evasion of entertainment tax, service tax and even income tax.

The task force was represented by the various stakeholders in the cable-TV industry, cable operators, broadcasters, multi-channel satellite operators, set box makers and consumers.

The task force submitted its final recommendations to the minister on December 26, 2001.

The report claimed that CAS would bring transparency in the system, since accurate figures of subscriber base would be available and broadcasters would not take the under-reporting plea for hikes in rates of pay channels.

A new task force was set up comprising cable operators, broadcasters, MSOs and consumers after the cable TV networks (regulation) act 1995 was amended to provide for CAS and a notification was issued under it on January 14 this year promising implementation of CAS within six months.