New Delhi, Jan 02: The inevitable roll back of Conditional Access System (CAS) is just a few days away. Strong indications to the effect, emerged on Wednesday after Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and BJP MP from South Delhi Vijay Kumar Malhotra met Information and Broadcasting Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad. Officials of the I&B Ministry present at the meeting later told The Pioneer that Mr Prasad expressed only "anguish" over the "manner" in which the new system was being rolled out.


"Mr Prasad was candid in telling Ms Dikshit that the Centre was unhappy with the behaviour of all stakeholders including the Delhi Government," the officials said.


Mr Prasad told The Pioneer that Ms Dikshit's administration has been asked to prepare a report on the ground situation and present it to the Centre within next five days.

"A final decision on the fate of CAS will be taken after that," he said.

However, sources in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry indicated that CAS is most likely to be rolled back. "CAS was introduced as a consumer-friendly measure.

But the way the cable operators have tried to derail it, there are few options before us," said an official.

The report is to be based on feedback from the Delhi Government's field units who are dealing with the implementation of CAS.

So far, even the Delhi BJP unit has been urging the Centre to stall CAS till such time that consumers were educated on the choice of pay channels and the use of technology (set-top boxes).

Officials said in view of the High Court's order on CAS implementation, they could not take their own time to put in place well-coordinated steps with the state govt for its introduction.

"If there was more time and cable operators were co-operative, CAS could definitely have been a success story," he said.