Press Release By INBA On Lack Of Censorship On Films & Other Multimedia Content Broadcasted Online

Indian National Bar Association (INBA) has been working diligently towards raising issues which are against societal norms.  Sh. Kaviraj Singh, Founder & Secretary General, Indian National Bar Association had earlier this month written to the Ministry on Information and Broadcasting, Ministry of Law and Justice, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Central Board of Film Certification to draw their attention to lack of regulatory regime vis-à-vis over-the-top (OTT) media services.

An over-the-top (OTT) media service is a streaming media service offered directly to viewers via the Internet. OTT bypasses cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms, the companies that traditionally act as a controller or distributor of such content.  The most popular OTT platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hot Star and ALT Balaji, among others.

Most of the OTT exhibit uncensored exhibition of obscene material, Anti-national Content, content insulting to certain religions and castes, including adult content with strong language, violence and sexually explicit scenes that are easily accessible to children. Unlike Films set for theatrical release and Television Content which is subject to prior approval (in the form of certification) from Central Board of Film Certification (“CBFC”) under Section 4 of the Cinematograph Act 1952 (Act No. 37 of 1952) (Hereinafter the “Act”) read with Cinematograph (Certification) Rules, 1983 (“Rules”) and the Cable Television Networks (Hereinafter the “CTN”) (Regulation) Act 1995 (Act No. 7 of 1995) read with Cable Television Networks Rules, 1994 (Hereinafter the “CTN Rules”) respectively, content distributed on OTT platforms is neither subject to any form of censorship nor it is regulated under any of the current laws in force.

A response dated 02.12.2016 to a Right to Information (“RTI”) Application, revealed that CBFC primarily certified only films set for theatrical release in accordance with the provisions of the Act and the Rules. 

It was further informed that it had no control over films appearing online and that the Ministry was not pursuing the creation of any regulatory framework for censorship of content appearing on the internet.

As a necessary consequence, such unregulated content can have adverse impact on the emotional and mental well-being of the viewers and highly inappropriate for children. 

It is not the case that these OTT’s are unaware of the need for regulation especially in view of the quality of the contents streamed over these platforms.

Moreover, in the name of censorship, these streaming services have been resorting to the precarious practice of self-censorship in the absence of censorship guidelines which is not justified as the content is hardly censored and the so called maturity ratings which Netflix and other OTT service alike boasts about, makes little to no difference. 

In addition, these OTT services have been releasing deleted parts of the films which were subjected to a prior CBFC certification. That in itself reduces the value of the certification warranted by CBFC to null.

Thereby, INBA requests Central Government to regulate the online content and only content censored  by Central Board of Film Certification should be broadcast.

By

INBA Team