Bombay high court on Wednesday refused to stay the implementation of conditional access system in the city and adjourned a bunch of public interest litigations for final orders in January.
CAS was to be introduced in south Mumbai with effect from September 1 but in view of fierce opposition from Shiv Sena and other quarters it remained a non-starter.
Hearing the PILs, Chief Justice C K Thakker and Justice A Oka said they were not inclined to grant the interim relief of staying CAS in Mumbai. The judges said the decision would depend on the final outcome of the PILs in the third week of January.
The PILs prayed for staying the implementation of CAS in Mumbai saying it was not in public interest but was being introduced for the benefit of the broadcasters.
The PILs were filed by Kirit Somaiya, BJP MP, Mangal Prabhat Lodha, BJP MLA, Subha Rao of Citizens for Just Society and others.
The PILs argued that Zee Television was earning Rs 592 crores (Rs 5.92 billion) revenue from advertisements per annum while Star TV earned double this amount.
Hence these channels should be treated as free channels and CAS should not be introduced, they submitted.
In New Delhi, implementation of CAS had been deferred because of state assembly elections as the ruling party feared that they may not get votes from the general public.
