Mumbai: Pune city authorities are cracking the whip on errant cable TV operators. According to reports, the Maharashtra state entertainment department has warned cable operators to renew their annual licences with the post office within the next month. Failing this, they would be penalized and face severe action.

The metro has about 1,000 cable TV operators serving about 500,000 subscribers. About 40 per cent of these have not renewed their licences despite being told by the authorities to do so. One of the reasons they have been delaying this, says observers, is their reluctance to pay entertainment tax.

The additional district collector met up with the cable TV operators in Pune and its surrounding areas, following which local officers decided to get tough with them.

Pune falls in the DAS area and cable TV operators have been mandated by government order to deliver cable TV signals to subscribers through a set top box, which would allow them to decide which channels they would like to watch. For this they would have to maintain, CAF forms as well as a list of channels that subscribers are signing up for.