In a swift turn around on Monday, the Bangladesh government lifted its ban on 11 of the 13 satellite channels it had imposed on Sunday.
The Bangladeshi ministry of information has now decided to give broadcast permission to all but two, MTV and Channel V, according to a report in national newspaper, Daily Star. The two continue to be penalised for their ‘ adverse impact of alien culture on religious and social values‘. The government had, after a five hour long meeting with cable ops, broadcasters and distributors on Sunday, decided to suspend broadcast of 13 satellite channels, both pay and FTA including HBO, Star Movies, Star World, MTV, Channel V, MGM, Hallmark, AXN, RAI TV, PTP, TVE, and SNTV.

The official handout, says the Daily Star, said the government reconsidered its earlier decision after reviewing the pleas by the satellite channel distributors. The distributors appealed to Information Secretary Mirza Tasadduk Hossain Beg yesterday for reconsideration of the decision, it added.

While the govenrment had gone ahead with the ban despite opposition by representatives of two distributors, Abul Khair Litu of Nationwide Communications and Humayun Majid of Translink, it has now ignored the rest of the stakeholders that include cable ops, channels, including BTV, ETV, Channel-i and ATN Bangla who supported the ban. M/S Nationwide distributes 27 out of 30 channels, while M/S Translink distributes the rest.

"It is surprising as well as suspicious that the government changed its mind so quickly," a member of the Cable Operators Association of Bangladesh (COAB) has been quoted by the Daily Star as saying."

There has been another fallout of the much-hyped issue of CAS‘ failure to get the okay of members of Parliament from the Rajya Sabha (Upper House of parliament). The political grapevine is abuzz with rumours that the prime mover of Cable TV Networks Regulations Amendment Bill, I&B minister Sushma Swaraj, may lose her portfolio in the impending Cabinet re-shuffleThe talk doing the rounds in the corridors of power in the capital is that the re-shuffle may well see Swaraj being replaced by one of the two former I&B ministers - information technology, communications and parliamentary affairs minister Pramod Mahajan or law minister Arun Jaitley. And the more likely candidate of the two is Mahajan, who just might get additional charge of the I&B ministry, the rumours say.

While the rumours play out, there is the business of managing the ministry. Swaraj is currently away at Cannes, but after she returns she will have to weigh two options if she is to push through the CATV amendments bill. Either Swaraj, the force who has been moving CAS forward despite many a hurdle, waits for the monsoon session of Parliament or bulldozes its implementation through the promulgation of an Ordinance (executive order) by the President.

According to senior officials in the I&B ministry, a "final decision" on the future course of action on CAS has not yet been taken. An official admitted: "CAS has hit a roadblock at a time when we were trying to regulate the unorganised sector of cable operation in the country."

However, the options before Swaraj and her supporters, points out a cable operator, is fraught with pitfalls.

The cable industry, which by and large had hailed the moves on CAS, feels that if the government waits for the monsoon session for the amendments to be passed on CAS, then it will give a chance to big broadcasters, controlled by powerful foreign media tycoons, to lobby against implementation of CAS immediately.

If the ordinance route is taken, then the government has to show sufficient proof that the issue of CAS is important enough for the President of the country to issue an executive order on its implementation even before all the members of Parliament from both the Houses get a chance to discuss the matter.

"It all depends on how much support Swaraj has in the government and in the higher echelons of the party on the CAS issue for an Ordinance to be promulgated. Specially at a time when the country is being rocked by more serious issues like security and a war-like situation on the borders with Pakistan," a government official who has been part of the Prime Minister‘s Office said.