Thousands of cricket buffs in India's hi-tech capital are relieved to watch live the on-going Videocon Cup tri-nation final between India and New Zealand, being played at Harare Tuesday.

Belying viewers' apprehensions of missing the action live, multi-system operators (MSOs) across the city suspended their flash strike and resumed the telecast following assurances by the state government to address their concerns.

"We resumed beaming all channels, including ESPN through cable operators after Karnataka Finance Minister P.G.R. Sindhia agreed to sort out the issue of us paying 10 per cent entertainment tax levied by the state commercial tax department.

"We were forced to suspend the cable service since Monday night to draw the government's attention on the issue, as cable operators were already paying the tax and the additional tax on us results in double taxation.

"This would mean more burden on subscribers," MSOs' representative and Siti Cable regional director P. Kailasam told here.

All the seven MSOs, including Hathway and Siti Cable, which receive the TV signals from broadcasters, resorted to a sudden blackout by stopping the feed to 1,200 cable operators that serve about 1.5 million subscribers across the city.

With the blackout coming at a time when the people are on a two-day holiday for Gauri and Ganesha festivals and raring to watch the ODI final, Sindhia summoned the MSOs and cable operators' association for a meeting to discuss the issue.

As a pre-condition to addressing their concerns, Sindhia directed the MSOs to first resume operations and sit across the table to sort out the problem.

By amending the Karnataka Entertainment Tax Act during the fiscal 2002-03, the state government had started levying an additional 10 percent entertainment tax on the amount the MSOs collect from cable operators.

Though the Karnataka High Court stayed the amendment, the state government went in for an appeal against the order in the Supreme Court where the case is still pending, Kailsasm said.

"By interpreting an order passed by the apex court in a similar case between the West Bengal government and Kolkata MSOs as being in its favour, the state government has been insisting that operators in the city cough up the tax, pending final settlement by the apex court.

"Our contention is we only distribute television signals of the broadcasters to the cable operators and hence do not provide any entertainment per se.

"Hence this means paying a new tax for a service we do not provide. We are only facilitators between broadcasters and cable providers," Kailasam asserted.