Broadcasting Bill, 2024

19 february 2025 - The Hindu

Law separates moral repugnancy from criminality.

Apoorva Arora v. Govt of NCT of delhi, 2024 - court quashed criminal proceedings for foul language in an OTT show called College Romance. The court demanded an objective test for obscenity, focusing on whether sexual or lustful thoughts were aroused and not on whether words were descent.

Section 69A of the IT act, 2000 gives the government to block access to a website. URLs blocked over the years in India But, decency and morality arent the grounds under the law for blocking the website.

This was exposed in 2010, when the government tried to block the website Savita Bhabhi.

There is surge of blocking orders from the government under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.

The Broadcasting bill, 2024 placed online creators in the saame bracket as traditional broadcasters. Now, the bill is gaining momentum after the vulgar comments of Ranveer Allahabadia and Samay Raina.

On janaury 2021, Amazon Prime released Tandav. This was accused of insulting the religious sentiments and the creators issued an apology.

The government introduced the Information Technology rules Part III covers the digital news media and OTT platforms.