Amidst the growing rivalry between Tamil Nadu state run Arasu Cable TV and Kalanidhi Maran’s Sumangali Cable Vision (SCV), the Tamil Nadu government’s cable TV corporation has now reported widespread damage to its network in Coimbatore and Vellore and blamed SCV officials for it.

About 20 km length of optic fibre cables (OFC) of Arasu Cable, through which TV signals are sent to households, were slashed on Friday at Peelamedu in Coimbatore, ruining precious tax payers’ money. Arasu Cable has estimated the total loss due to continuous damage to its OFCs over the past one month at a whopping Rs 15.67 crore.

Coimbatore police has filed FIRs against SCV manager Nadesan and a few other SCV operators. “However, till date no action has been taken against any SCV official. Almost all our operators have shifted to SCV and a few are out of business now,” rues the Arasu Cable TV Corporation head in-charge in Coimbatore, P Arjunan.

When contacted, SCV manager Nadesan said he was not “a competent official” to respond to the allegations. Kalanithi Maran was not available for comment. IT secretary P W C Davidar, who took charge of Arasu Cable on January 29, said he had directed the officials to lodge police complaints against cable cutting.

Reacting to his predecessor’s recommendation for action against SCV, he said, “I have taken charge only now. I have to go through the files and look at the grounds on which he had made the recommendations.”

Arasu Cable Corporation was launched by the DMK-led government on July 15, 2008, with Rs 31 crore initial investment and the promise of providing TV signals to households at a meagre Rs 100. The avowed aim was to deliver cable TV services at affordable rates and thereby prevent private multi-system operators (MSOs) from profiteering. Arasu Cable was able to soon garner about 62,000 subscribers and earn an estimated monthly revenue of Rs 32.29 lakh.

The dip in Arasu Cable’s fortunes come at a time when its chief and senior IAS officer C Umashankar has been given marching orders. Umashankar was transferred last week, within 24 hours after he demanded nationalisation of Sumangali Cable Vision for “illegal and rogue activities”.

In a letter to Davidar, Umashankar had earlier said, “We invite your kind attention to the difficulties of Arasu Cable TV Corporation in implementing the government policy of providing cable TV signals to the common man at affordable cost, in view of the unlawful blocking of our business activities by Sumangali Cable Vision (SCV).

“We have also brought on record the disruptive activities of SCV in Coimbatore region where they have successfully slashed the OFC (optic fibre cables) of Arasu Cable TV in over 60 spots in the last four weeks.” the letter reads.

“SCV is a privately managed company. We propose that the government should nationalise Sumangali Cable Vision alone on urgent basis, if SCV could successfully terrorise a government owned company, one can imagine the plight of the other competing MSOs in Tamil Nadu,” he wrote.

Following his transfer, a pained Umashankar, who has been moved to the small savings department, is said to have written to chief secretary KS Sripathi, saying he is “completely demoralized” over being “punished” for having been “honest and upright”.