Chennai: The Tamil Nadu Arasu Cable TV Corporation Ltd (TACTV) on Friday directed Special Tahsildars/ Deputy Managers to stop transmission of 25 Sun TV group channels in analogue mode from its network for non-conclusion of price negotiation between TACTV and Kal Media Service Pvt Ltd.
The simmering tussle between Arasu Cable and Sun TV has reached the flashing point once again due to lack of consensus in pricing the subscription revenue of Sun TV Network channels that are being aired in analogue mode on Arasu Cable.
The state owned Cable Corporation has signed two separate distribution agreements with Sun TV Network for Digital and Analogue feeds. Arasu Cable is paying Rs 4 Crores towards Monthly Subscription revenue for the Digital feed of Sun TV Network and Rs 2.75 Crores monthly for its Analogue feed. With significant increase in Digital Subscription, the volume of analogue subscription in Tamil Nadu is dwindling day by day. Due to this factor Arasu Cable TV is constantly re-negotiating and reducing the analogue related payouts with various stakeholders. However, it was not able to convince Sun TV Network to reduce the Analogue rates from Rs 2.75 Crore to a lesser amount. Hence, notice has been served and subsequently the disconnection order was also issues.
The order issued by J. Kumaragurbaran, Managing Director, TACTV, said the cable corporation issued a public notice to Kal Media (Sun TV group) on 13th May under section 4.2 of the Telecommunication (broadcasting and cable services) Interconnection Regulations 2004 for non-conclusion of the price negotiation,
“All deputy managers/ special Tahsildars are hereby instructed to stop the transmission of 25 Sun TV group channels in analog mode from the midnight of 3rd June 2018,” the order said.
Decoder boxes of all channels should be recovered from the control rooms and should be kept in the deputy manager office, according to the order.
It may be noted that both Arasu Cable and Sun TV Network locked horns in December 2017 over the pricing of its digital feed that was settled after the intervention of TDSAT.
