Cable TV subscription bill for just Rs 77 a month. Pay Channels for Rs 5 a month. Stereo Radio stations other than the ones which ply in your metro. Digital quality sound and video. All this is going to a reality by December 31, 2006. TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) has come out with some recommendations for introduction of CAS (Conditional Access System) in the four metros of India after the Supreme Court ruling by Dec 31, 2006.
We Chennaiites always miss out watching good things on TV. Be it Sports action like Grand Slam Tennis, Formula One grand prix, Cricket Action, etc.. or Hindi entertainment channels or English entertainment channels. Now, what I care is Sports action. 
I have a DVD collection that English movie channels would envy, and I don’t watch much Hindi stuffs but for the movies.
We were made scapegoats and wait for SCV (a leading MSO here) to negotiate with the channels to bring out sports action or retort to Live Streaming, etc…
Let’s take the TRAI ruling now and what really was going on in Chennai for over three years.
Operator should charge not more than Rs. 77 for a bouquet of a minimum of 30 channels
We pay Rs. 100 (actually it’s 98 Rs only, 2 Rs tips for the man who comes to collect the amount). Now I’m not sure if this amount is including or excluding taxes. I’m not sure about the number of channels but it’ll around 60 channels.
A ceiling of Rs 5 for Pay Channels
TRAI announced that pay channels should not fix price not more than Rs. 5 for each pay channels. TRAI ‘calculated’ this figure, when TATA and Star announced 12 channels for Rs 27. Note that this Rs. 5 would be applicable only if we subscribe for atleast four months before we decide whether we want to continue subscribing to the channel.
Here in Chennai, all the major channels are priced atleast Rs. 25-30 per month.
Each Channels should be made available individually even though they are marketed/available as a bouquet
TRAI made clear that each and every channel should be made available for subscription even though they are marketed/available as a bouquet, irrespective whether you get discounts for subscribing as a bouquet. A very good movie. In Chennai most of the channels (like Ten Sports) are not available individually.
2 schemes in case we don’t want to buy the STB
One of the scheme is that subscribers have to pay 30 Rs per month and a refundable deposit of Rs 999. They will refund after deducting Rs. 12.5 per month for the use of the STB.
Another scheme is that that subscribers have to pay 45 Rs per month for a Digital STB and Rs 30 for analog STB and a refundable deposit of Rs 250. They will refund after deducting Rs. 3 per month for the use of the STB.
I don’t know if the above made any sense, but atleast we have choice. Initially we did have STB for hire, but not any longer. In Chennai we have to buy the STB for Rs. 3250 (excluding taxes, Smart Card, and all that jazz).
A subscriber will not have to pay any separate charges for the installation, activation or reactivation of the Smart Card.
We pay Rs 250 for the Smart Card. That was when CAS was introduced here in Chennai. I don’t know if still pay for the Smart Card.
CAS - From Can’t See TV to Can See TV
Seeing all this and how Chennaiites have suffered for the past three years, it’s a great news that TRAI has come out to create some serious pain-in-ass for the MSOs and the pay channels. So CAS has become from Can’t See TV to Can See TV. Now it has become from a bane to boon!
Now some of the channels will be forced to be Free To Air (FTA). Even when CAS was introduced in Chennai, many regional paid channels (like Star Vijay, K TV) was forced to be FTA channels. Even Disney’s two channels were forced to be made FTA as the subscription is never going to be high with CAS aroun. And not to forget, we subscribe to channels for a lesser amount and not to forget that our overall expenditure over cable TV will come down.
No customer is against CAS (even in Chennai), but rolling out only in only place was not fair. CAS is now going to be rolled out in the four metros from December 31, 2006. Now I’m happy and so are Chennaiites!
[tags]CAS, set top box, chennai, india, TRAI, stb[/tags]
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11 comments ↓
Hope it is rolled out in my city soon..
Now, here in Gujarat,some cable operators like Incable & Siticable are ready to start CAS but state gov. has not announced about it so they & viwers has to wait.
1 other thing I really doubt that all major channels have strongly opposed this Trai rates.If they forced, going to court is always easy , then implementing & who is going to believe gov. which take a sec to change decision(either by mind or money)
TRAI made a smart move. When TATA-Star DTH was introduced, they put ads like: “Get 12 Channels for Rs 27″. TRAI made this Rs 5 thing based on that.
Moreover that’s why they didn’t come out with the recommendation late also. More than 100 days for all the stake holders.
I’m having my hand crossed. Hope CAS is rolled out in the other 3 metros by the end of this year.
Here is kerala we get most of the channels for 150rs flat. The service is not tht great. i dnt get some good channels.
Well in that case most of the places in TN (I don’t know about big cities) charge only 100 bucks. Of course you won’t get all the channels but atleast it’s better than the shit we get to see in Chennai.
i was contemplating on getting the dish tv or the new tata sky but after this TRAI ruling i am thinkin of waiting to see what really happens if at all these rules come into picture..
Aravind -
Tata Sky or Dish is DTH. We get superior quality sound and picture. Not the mention the other jazz like camera angle (for sports events like Cricket), on demand movies (Rs 40 and Rs 75 for Dish and Tata resp.), etc..
IMO DTH will be cheaper than STB based cable entertainment eventually.
Hi,
Chennaites can have a sigh of relief with latest announcements by TRAI regarding STB rental schemes and Price capping of Rs.5/- per pay channel. At last we can see sports channels without waiting anxiously for the SCV to provide us the signals.
But as I contacted SCV for STB, as per the press release of TRAI on 8-12-2006, the response was really very poor. In fact they are asking us to contact the cable operator, but the LCO is telling that they have no such options in front of them. Repeated queries to the MSO and LCO are not bearing any fruit.
In the mean time, Hathway is offering STB at the rates prescribed by TRAI, but in Chennai, the Cable Operator depend upon the signals of sCV in our locality, and hence I can not go for a Hathway connection. This is very ridiculous, as even when I am ready to pay for the STB and Pay channels, I can not get the same.
Is TRAI hearing?????
CAS came into force in Chennai in 1993. And it took nearly 4 Years for other metros to follow suit. TRAI took the best of efforts to see that CAS is implemented and with the best support from the Judiciary, things were in place. 2007 dawned for three metros, viz., Delhi, Mumbai and Calcutta, changing the way the people watched television.
There were people, applied a theory of wait and watch, people immediately swallowed the DTH, people applied for STBs with various MSOs. And the most benefited person was the consumer. The guidelines were clear, the prices reasonable, and the schemes attractive. Consumers in Delhi, Mumbai and Calcutta were lured by DTH service providers, MSOs and THE CUSTOMER WAS THE KING!!
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Read the full article here:
http://ashwinr.com/2007/02/15/.....nnai-vasi/
Ganesh!
Good reading man. How you managed to write an essay? Did you write or read this somewhere?
[...] Today a reader of this blog, Ganesh commented in this post: Why CAS may still be good for Chennai. [...]
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