DTH provider Tata Sky has decided not to renew their agreement with Viacom 18 and Network 18 channels, thus effectively ceasing to broadcast around 56 TV18 channels on their DTH connection.
Following this move, the Information & Broadcast Ministry has further advised Tata Sky and other DTH companies to set RepublicTV or ZeeTV as the default channels under their set-top box settings so as to achieve a complete sense of patriotism among the public.
Besides TataSky, DTH operators like Airtel, DishTV, Videocon etc have also been directed to bury channels like NDTV and ABP News among the array of available channels. These unreliable channels shall preferably be placed on the bottom priority or even pushed further away in the end, somewhere after Aastha and Sanskar channels. A council of experts has even suggested to keep on shuffling the channel numbers for these channels as an extra measure to confuse viewers and curb their viewership.
Initially, this setup shall be introduced only as a default setting but if things run smoothly, RepublicTV and ZeeTV shall mandatorily run for 30 minutes after initially turning on the TV set. It will be only after the passage of 30 mins that one shall be able to switch to other channels. At the same time, the threshold limit for watching NDTV shall not be more than 15 minutes, after which the TV shall automatically get switched off.
If sources are to be trusted, the Modi Government is not satisfied with mandating the National Anthem in movie theatres only and wants patriotism to reach every household. Hence, the Information and Broadcast Ministry launched a new approach to around patriotism through an awareness campaign so as to achieve better ranking among other countries.
I&B Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore was quoted saying “Research indicates that every one minute of watching RepublicTV or Zee News shall increase India’s performance in the Olympics!”
In a meeting called by Rathore, TV manufacturers have been advised to set direct press buttons for RepublicTV and Zee News which will instantly re-direct viewers to the respective channels. The government also plans to run advertisements preferably during the Asia Cup Cricket matches so as to remind public about the Surgical Strikes.
