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TN CM alleges central govt favouring Maran family
MUMBAI: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Thursday accused the central government of deliberately not issuing Digital Addressable System (DAS) licence to Arasu Cable TV Corporation in order to benefit Maran family-owned cable TV network.
Talking at the 57th National Development Council meeting in New Delhi, Jayalalitha lashed out at the Manmohan Singh-led government for its in-different attitude to Tamil Nadu.
"Every single legitimate request of our State has been turned down or ignored and every initiative stymied," she said during her speech at the meeting.
She pointed out how the government is yet to grant a licence to Arasu five months after applying for the same.
"Even a simple request from a State PSU for a Digital Addressable System (DAS) License for Chennai City has not been granted on totally extraneous considerations," Jayalalitha added.
Despite repeated representations to the Prime Minister and the concerned Union Minister, the DAS licence is yet to be given to the Tamil Nadu Arasu Cable TV Corporation.
While asserting that Arasu Cable caters to the poor and the middle class by providing cable TV service at nominal costs, without naming anyone she said that the government was "facilitating" the business interests of Sun Group, which also owns Sumangali Cablevision, a multi-system operator competing with Arasu.
"The deliberate non-issuance of DAS licence to the state government-owned Tamil Nadu Arasu Cable TV Corporation is only to facilitate the business interests of a particular family which forms part of the ruling coalition at the Centre," she alleged.
"This vindictive and discriminative act of the Government of India is highly condemnable and is yet another example of subverting the interest of the common people and the ruling dispensation‘s perpetual pandering to allies to ensure the survival of the Central Government."
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Inshorts Group chief Deepit Purkayastha joins IAB video council for Southeast Asia and India
The co-founder and chief executive of the short-form content platform has been inducted into the IAB SEA+India Video Council, giving India a stronger voice in shaping digital video frameworks
NOIDA: India has long been the world’s most chaotic, multilingual and mobile-first digital market. Now, one of its most prominent short-video executives is getting a seat at the table where the rules are written.
Deepit Purkayastha, co-founder and chief executive of Inshorts Group, has been selected as a member of the IAB SEA+India Video Council for 2026. Run by the Interactive Advertising Bureau, the council brings together senior leaders from Southeast Asia and India to shape standards, best practices and measurement frameworks for the fast-evolving video and digital advertising ecosystem.
The timing is pointed. According to the IAMAI-Kantar Internet in India Report 2025, over 588 million Indians are now consuming short-video content, with growth increasingly driven by rural and non-metro audiences. India’s active internet user base has crossed 950 million, with 57 per cent of users now coming from rural markets. Yet the frameworks that govern how video consumption is measured and monetised were largely designed for single-language, Western markets and have struggled to keep pace with the scale, diversity and complexity of India’s digital landscape.
Purkayastha is no stranger to these debates. He already serves on the AI Council at Marketing and Media Alliance India and as co-chair of the Digital Entertainment Committee at the Internet and Mobile Association of India. His induction into the IAB SEA+India Video Council extends that influence into the global video standards arena.
Inshorts Group sits squarely at the intersection of these forces. Its flagship product, Inshorts, India’s highest-rated short news app, reaches 12 million active users with 60-word news summaries. Its sister platform, Public App, reaches 80 million monthly active users across more than 700 districts and 12 languages, serving communities that most global platforms barely register.
Purkayastha said the opportunity was about building something more representative. “India today sits at the centre of the global video ecosystem, but the frameworks that define how value is created and measured have not always kept pace with the realities of our market,” he said. “Being part of the IAB SEA+India Video Council is an opportunity to contribute to a more representative and future-ready approach, one that accounts for diversity in language, context, and user intent.”
As a council member, Purkayastha will contribute to shaping regional standards across video advertising, measurement and platform governance, with a focus on frameworks that are native to India’s multilingual, mobile-first ecosystem rather than imported from global benchmarks designed elsewhere.
For years, India has been content to play by rules written for other markets. Purkayastha’s induction is a signal that it is done waiting to be consulted and ready to start writing them.
