Cable TV rates may be hiked by 2010

This New Year, India will wake up to an irritant other than the customary hangover: cable TV will cost more per month in 2010 than it does now. The revised rates, to be settled soon by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), is expected to affect all non-Conditional Access System (CAS) areas.

Those areas account for most of India, barring a few zones in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Chennai in its entirety. At present, the monthly cable TV bill in the in non-CAS areas falls in the Rs77 to Rs260 range.

Trai has been under pressure, from a significant proportion of broadcasters, to refrain from capping cable TV rates. The broadcasters' argument is that setting limits on rates causes a rise in carriage fees that have to be paid to operators. That, in turn, hits subscription revenues, the broadcasters say.

On the other hand, cable operators fear that escalating tariffs will drive subscribers to digital options such as DTH, IPTV, or HITS.