The government has cleared the headend in the sky (HITS) project of Subhash Chandra's Siti Cable as an alternate cable television distribution system.

According to senior information and broadcasting ministry officials, "We have cleared the proposal by Siti Cable to set up HITS as a platform to distribute cable television."

• The New Cable TV Regime

Under this system, Siti would collate the satellite signals of all the broadcasters and then use a satellite to transmit them to the cable operators. The cable operators would use his network to distribute it to homes.

"This is one step ahead of the present system. Siti would uplink the channels from India to its satellite and them downlink them to the cable operators," said the official.

The cable operators would work just as the last mile connectivity provider while the content would be provided by Siti Cable.

Significantly, it would not be possible to tamper with the feed received from the HITS system.

According to a blueprint of the headend in the sky proposal prepared by Siti Cable, the subscriber would use a set-top box to access the channel depending on whether it is a pay channel of a free-to-air channel.

The company is working on the logistics of the roll out of the system and it is expecting to roll out the services on August 15.

"We are working on the prices as well as how to roll out the system among the various cable operators in the country. We are at present undertaking the trial runs," said a Siti Cable executive adding that the company would announce the prices for the channels and the services it would offer soon.