India exempts custom duty for STB parts


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Rebecca Hawkes

| 01 March 2016




Basic custom duty has been exempted for set-top box (STB) components in India’s Union Budget for 2016-17, in what is being hailed as a boost to the cable and satellite TV industry.


Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has announced that parts and components, subparts for the manufacture of routers, broadband modems, STBs for gaining Internet access, TV STBs, digital video recorders and network video recorders are among the electronic equipment which will now be exempt from custom duty.

Excise duty on these parts and products has also dropped from 12.5% to 4% as part of the budget.

“We are very happy about the excise duty changes proposed for set-top boxes, which will help in the last mile infrastructure of Digital Addressable System (DAS) Phase 3 and 4,” Times Network CEO and MD, MK Anand, told IndianTelevision.com.

“Overall, a stable and positive fiscal situation is good for the economy and that will support our ad sales growth projections. All in all budget 2016 looks good for the broadcast sector,” he added.