Blow to DMK, Jaya moves bill for cable takeover

Soon after the bill was tabled in the House, Maran and a shocked DMK chief, M Karunanidhi, submitted a memorandum to the Governor, urging him not to assent to the bill once it was passed. The DMK chief also called an emergency meeting of party leaders.

The J. Jayalalithaa government, for its part, said it had received ‘‘numerous complaints’’ on, among other matters, cable network facilities, ‘‘prohibitive’’ charges for package channels, and ‘‘selective blurring’’ of certain channels.

‘‘Public viewing and welfare are of paramount consideration and the government cannot shirk its responsibility in this sphere,’’ a statement of objects and reasons appended to the bill said.

The bill, however, keeps the ‘‘small, street-level, tail-end’’ cable operators out of the government’s purview.

If the bill receives assent, it could prove a big blow to the Maran family and to the DMK which depends heavily on Sun TV for its propaganda, particularly in the run-up to a crucial Assembly election slated for May this year.

Sumangali Cable Vision—of which Dayanidhi Maran was CEO until he was made a union minister in 2004— virtually controls 85 per cent of the network in Chennai and 100 per cent in Madurai, Tiruchirapalli and Coimbatore. It is the backbone of the Sun Network Group, a closely held unlisted company, headed by Dayanidhi’s brother Kalanidhi, with 13 channels, four FM radio stations, four magazines and two newspapers with a turnover of hundreds of crores.

The bill comes two days after the Madras HC directed the Union Communications Ministry, headed by Dayanidhi, ‘‘to consider’’ an application from Jaya TV for a teleport operations licence for its 24-hours news channel. The Jayalalithaa-backed television channel has been waiting for nearly two years for the licence. Only Sun TV has a 24-hour Tamil news channel.