Mumbai Completes 50% of the Digitization Target
The Cable Television Networks
(Regulation) Amendment Act, 2011 has made it mandatory for switchover of the
existing analogue Cable TV networks to Digital Addressable System (DAS) by
December 2014, in the entire Country in four phases. In the first phase, four
metro cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai are to be covered by 31st
Oct 2012.
The Ministry of Information &
Broadcasting has been constantly coordinating with the stakeholders of the
cable television industry, namely, broadcasters, Multi-System Operators (MSOs)
and Local Cable Operators in its endeavour to ensure
that the deadline of 31st October, 2012 is met and TV viewers in the
4 metro cities are in position to have the pleasure of experiencing digital
broadcast without any interruption.
The Ministry has been constantly reviewing the
preparedness of the industry for the digital switch-over. Installation
of Set Top Boxes in cable TV homes is the most crucial precondition for digital
switch over of cable television. Therefore, this has been under the prime focus
of the Ministry. A review by the Ministry has revealed that in Mumbai city, 50%
of cable TV homes have already been installed with STBs. In Mumbai, there is an
estimated requirement of 34.85 lakh STBs and so far
17.07 lakh STBs have been installed. The MSO-wise
installation of STBs in Mumbai is as under:
National level MSOs
Hathway -
6.16 lakh, Den
- 1.40 lakh Digicable - 2.57 lakh
IMCL - 4.77 lakh WWIL - 0.50 lakh
Independent MSOs- 1.69 lakh
Some other initiatives of the
Ministry towards digitization are as under:
(i)
Fortnightly
meetings of the Task Force with all the stakeholders are being held to
take constant stock of the progress and to chalk out the measures to address
emerging concerns. So far 14 meetings
have taken place.
(ii)
Meetings are being held with National level and
independent Multi-Systems Operators every 15 days to assess their preparedness
in terms of head-end capacities to carry minimum 200 TV channels to be extended
to 500 channels from 1st January, 2012 and the progress of
installation of Set Top Boxes in cable TV homes. They have also been advised to
prepare micro plan for completion of the requisite task within the deadline and
complete all the infrastructural preparations within time.
(iii)
In order to enable the MSOs to online up-load the data
on the website of the Ministry, the Ministry has put in place a software and
the website has been enabled for the purpose of real time collection of data. The
software will automatically generate analytical information based on the data
uploaded, resulting in a clear view of the progress made. This will not only be
useful for MSOs and other stakeholders but also for the Ministry, as it will
infuse transparency in the system and
enable timely corrective action taken
(iv)
The completion of negotiation and the signing of
interconnection agreements between the channel aggregators/ broadcasters and
MSOs is one of the pre-requisites for implementation of digital switch-over. In
order to facilitate mutually acceptable and workable negotiations in a
transparent manner between the channel aggregators/ broadcasters and MSOs, the
Ministry had requested them to have recourse to an open house sessions from 9th
to 20th July 2012, from 9.30 am to 5.30 pm, in all the four metro
cities so that conclusive agreements could be worked out by them on time.
