Buy a set-top box, get pay channels free for a month

After spurning a pre-CAS "honeymoon" time proposal, broadcasters are likely to come up with an incentive scheme of offering all pay channels free for a month to cable TV subscribers opting for set-top boxes to view them.

While Zee's Subhash Chandra has already conveyed this new formula to the information and broadcasting ministry on Thursday, other broadcasters are expected to come up with similar offers and claim they may extend the offer beyond a month.

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Though this would also amount to offering all channels for Rs 72, which is the rate of the basic tier of free-to-air channels, it would be only for those opting for set-top boxes.

The broadcasters, who had rejected the proposal of offering all channels for Rs 72 to all cable subscribers till their zone got notified for conditional access system, feel they should give some incentive to viewers who opt for set-top boxes that would be required to view pay channels in the new regime.

However, with broadcasters, multi-system operators and cable operators still wrangling over CAS-related issues and having had to go back on earlier promises, the government is adopting a wait-and-watch approach, ministry sources said.

The government also hopes the broadcasters will come out with new rates for pay channels before August 14, when the next meeting of the implementation committee is scheduled to be held in New Delhi, they said.

Meanwhile, another government notification is likely soon making it mandatory for cable operators and MSOs to intimate the subscribers about details of STBS.

The notification, sources said, would require the cable operators to inform about rates, type (analog or digital), technical specifications, payment schemes, warrantee, details of maintenance and validity of offer of set-top boxes at least 15 days before a zone gets notified for CAS.

The government is also asking MSOs to ensure that STBs are available on refundable basis so that there is no problem of transferring from one area to another.

According to projected figures, 435,000 STBs would be available by September 1, when CAS rolls out in the first zones of Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata and the whole of Chennai.     

While the government has asked the broadcasters to come out with MRP rates, it is aware of the face-off between stakeholders.

Sources said Zee's plans of Headends In The Sky technology have faced hiccups with Sony and Star playing hard to get.

The Central Board of Excise and Customs has extended the period of customs duty reduction upto September 30.