"We have sent a draft of the amendments to the Law Ministry for vetting, following which we will carry out the amendments in the Cable Television Networks Rules, 2012," Uday Kumar Varma, Secretary of the Ministry, told PTI.
After the amendments are carried out, the ministry would be empowered to take stricter action against multi-system operators (MSOs) and other stakeholders if their information on the number of set top boxes (STBs) procured and installed is found to be incorrect.
The penal action could even amount to cancellation of the licence of an operator.
"It had been observed that in some instances the data that was provided to the ministry about the progress made in digitisation was contradictory. So we have decided to hold the organisations accountable if they provide us incorrect data," he said.
The I&B Ministry also proposes to make it compulsory for all operators to provide information within a preset time-frame, sources said.
The cable rules were earlier notified in April to provide the framework on which the digitalised cable networks would function. MORE