In what appears to be a rollback on conditional access system, the cable industry on Tuesday decided to offer three Hindi entertainment channels -- Star Plus, Zee TV and Sony -- without the set top box till January 1 next year.
After another marathon meeting between cable operators and multi system operators including Siti Cable, Hathway, Spectranet and others, it was decided to offer these three channels as free-to-air till New Year to allow more time for consumers to buy and install the boxes.
Hathway North India chief S N Sharma said: "Members of the cable industry conveyed that the general subscriber has welcomed CAS but consumers wanted a week to 10 days more so that the installation and purchase of STBs can be smoothly completed."
When asked whether the rollbacks would continue and other pay channels will also become FTA, Sharma said "all other pay channels will be encrypted and hence will be available through a STB only."
While the three entertainment channels have been made free to air for some time, cable operators also showed the India-Australia match.
Besides, cable operators in several areas have been intermittently showing pay channels also since Sunday night, unable to gear up to the technological challenge CAS presents.
Meanwhile, the government said on Monday that it was monitoring the rollout of CAS in South Delhi and will assess, over the next few days, the cable operators' preparedness in terms of technology, subscriber management and make the entire process consumer friendly.