Dear Gulveen

This is in response to the news article DoT, TRAI against move to delay
Cable digitization by a year We really don't know from where you have got
your data and analysis, to do this kind of a misleading story/ article. Anyways
let me put your facts correct here, so you are not coxed into doing these kind
of misleading stories in the future.

1. This DAS regulation was brought in such a hurry by way of bringing in
an ordinance sometime in Dec 2011 by the erstwhile UPA Government.
Later the then I&B Minister Mrs. Ambika Soni got the amendment bill to
the Cable TV Regulation Act 1995 passed in the Parliament in the first
Parliament Session of 2012 ( We never witnessed such an efficiency in
the entire UPA tenure for other more important issues )

2. Arbitrarily the phase- I , was notified to be implemented within 6 months
Phase- I DAS notified areas were Delhi, Mumbai. Chennai and Kolkata.
The implementation Task force was made on the instructions of Mr. Uday
Verma then Secretary I&B. The task force members were mostly the
DTH operators, Star TV and their aligned MSOs and few Distributors of
these Pay TV Broadcaster aligned MSOs like DEN Networks, Siti Cable &
Hathway Cable & Datacom. When the industry at large objected to this
task force composition, they were not invited/ allowed to attend any of
the Task Force meetings.

3. Mr. Uday Vermas core team comprising Ms. Supriya Sahu, K.S Regimon
and Yogendra Pal spearheaded the entire hurried implementation plan
One Honest senior officer Mr. Rajeev Takru decided to get his transfer
done to some other Ministry, when he could not cope up with all
manipulations being done at the MIB.

4. We raised issues on indigenous STB manufacturing, TRAI to prescribe
MRP rates for the pay TV channels, Registration of the LCO/LMOs who
are an integral link on this distribution value chain. Our provisional
MSO registration / Licence issued was cancelled to send a message
across that if anyone will oppose or question this flawed
implementation then be prepared to have your MSO licence cancelled ,
even the Judiciary was instructed to not pass any orders on this DAS
implementation. (Any how we got our MSO registration restored on our
plea to the double bench of the Delhi High Court. On our matter been
extensively argued by Mr. Aman Lekhi

5. Anyways the implementation of DAS was to be from 31
st
Oct 2012 in the
4 notified metros and the entire MIB team was working overnight to
ensure no analogue transmission was running Due to shortage of STBs
a lot of consumers faced cable tv blackout for weeks, but this was not
reported on any news channel or newspaper as Mr. Uday Verma had
personally summoned all the editors and had warned them not to cover
any stories on consumer apathy and woes due to DAS implementation.

6. Interestingly the then I&B Minister Mrs. Ambika Soni just 3 days before
the implementation deadline of DAS left her ministry and charge was
handed over to Mr. Manish Tiwari, Who when contacted by various
consumer groups and industry associations very conveniently made the
excuse of he just taking over the charge and not aware of what his
predecessor has done.

7. You can check at your end from the business correspondent on the
historic valuation data of the US$ from July 2012 till Dec 2012 when
the US$ went to its highest.

8. Most importantly the Digitization is in no way a facilitation to broadband,
Digital Cable technology has nothing to do even remotely with the
Internet and broadband technology especially when we have only got
substandard plain vanilla STBs imported from china. After over
invoicing them in order to launder Billions of US$ on behalf of few
beneficiaries who had masterminded this DAS Scam
Kindly go through the attachments / our various representations made to the
Government in the past 2 years that will enlighten you on the dubious roles
played by the TRAI, Pay TV broadcasters, their aligned MSOs and DTH
operators. While DoT has really no concern in this entire business of DAS.

So at least you will understand the matter better, before doing any coxed
stories in future.


With Best Regards



Vikki Choudhry
President- NCTA
National Cable & Telecommunication Association
E : vikki@ncta.in
M: +91 98111 44467
W: www.ncta.in