The central government is committed to ensuring that the consumer does not have to pay more for receiving television channels after the conditional access system for cable networks comes into operation next month.

Addressing a political conference of the Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party, BJP president M Venkaiah Naidu said on Thursday that the BJP has been putting pressure on the government to ensure that the consumer pays less than he is paying presently for receiving the pay channels in the post-CAS regime.

CAS: The New Cable TV Regime

He said that the party, unlike the Congress, had been consistent in its view vis-a-vis CAS and there was no question of making viewers pay more that what they were at present.

After the broadcasters had come up with very high rates last week, Information and Broadcasting Secretary Pawan Chopra said the government would have to consider coercing them legally to come up with acceptable rates.

He said he would prefer that the total price of pay channels and the fee for free-to-air channels should not exceed Rs 200 in the post-CAS era.

Later, the cable operators had jointly said the government should fix a maximum rate of Rs 75 for the pay channels with another Rs 75 for their transmission and carriage.

Some broadcasters had assured the ministry on Wednesday that they would come up with new rates next week.

Though a notification issued last week had made it clear that the list of free-to-air and the prices of the pay channels must be declared by June 15, the government had relented and decided to give them a few more days as the deadline fell over a weekend.

It is learnt that some of the broadcasters are now planning to offer cross-channel bouquets comprising channels of different genres.

UNI