CASBAA Lobbies for Cable TV Upgrades in India

MUMBAI, March 23:
Investment in India’s cable TV infrastructure could boost the country’s
national economic activity by 54.6 billion rupees ($1.2 billion) within five
years, according to the Cable & Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia
(CASBAA).

The organization also
notes that the country could gain some 18 billion rupees in additional tax
revenues by upgrading local cable systems. However, even with a target of 20
million cable broadband subscribers by 2010, the India market would remain less
than half the size of the China market.

“To achieve this goal we
will need a new approach to capital investment in pay-TV, including abandoning
the view that cable should be treated as a utility with commodity-like price
controls,” said Anjan Mitra, CASBAA’s executive director for India. “Today, the
approach is more in-line with old-style thinking on electricity services or
traditional political battlefields like print media. The fact is that if we
don’t change our entire attitude to cable, we could suffer nothing less than a
‘digital failure’. However, if policymakers get the environment right, there
will be huge rewards for the economy, first in the big cities, but then rolling
out to the still needy rural areas.”

With around 70 million
homes wired, cable TV already plays a bigger role in India than in any other
major market.

CASBAA is calling on the
Indian government to learn the lessons of telecoms liberalization and to let
consumers decide what they want to pay for cable TV services and what they want
to watch. According to John Medeiros, the CASBAA VP for regulatory affairs and
government relations, “digital broadband is changing the face of the
economically crucial global communications sector and India will benefit hugely
if it joins that revolution.”

Medeiros added, “The very
nature of (digital) cable broadband provides consumers with more content choice
and more price options; on-demand services become pervasive, allowing people to
choose exactly what they want to watch and when, as well as yet more choice in
terms of linear (traditional) TV channels.”

Government funds are not
need to lead this reform, CASBAA said, just a supportive regulatory
environment.