"About three weeks ago, during the negotiations, Sony published a disconnection notice applicable from 30 September midnight," he added. Tata Sky said it has retained the channels with good viewership numbers, at a la carte rates and are paying a considerable premium (almost three times) to Sony as per their rate card versus contracted rates, in the interest of its subscribers. The DTH player has retained 10 channels including Set, Sony Sab, Set HD, and Aaj Tak. Kaul, however, claimed that Tata Sky had signed an RIO (reference inter-connect offer) for the 10 channels and it could have done the same for the other 22 channels as well.

Tata Sky  has stopped 23 out of 34 channels from the bundles of the Sony network and Sony is still in the process of resolving the issue officially with the direct to home (DTH) service provider.

These backend negotiations had not deterred Sony from utilizing other means toresolve the issues. Sony has launched a video campaign with two videos doing rounds on social media convincing the Tata Sky subscribers to “Demand For Sony Channels”. These videos are made in Hindi and English under the hashtag #DemandForSony and are featuring sports experts and other TV celebrities.

Along with that, Sony is also putting up a quite visible fight on twitter to make the consumer understand that Sony has not stopped the channels and it’s only the DTH provider who can resolve the issue.

Sony’s flagship Hindi general entertainment channel (GEC) Sony entertainment television is not doing very well these days in terms of numbers and is unable to put a fight like it was doing four to five years back against its competitors. Indian Idol is the only programme which many viewers will miss on Sony’s GEC.

However, Sony has quite a healthy line up of sports channel with Australia-Pakistan match currently being broadcasted. Champions League’s matches will also be broadcasted on the sports channel of the network along with the upcoming bilateral series of India and Australia. The network has also signed content deals with many International cricket boards and therefore subscribers of Tata sky will miss out these sport events if the tussle between both companies goes on like this.

Sony is trying to create demands for its channels with the help of this new campaign.