The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting observed that over the last few months, there were several television channels including mainstream channels that reported accidents, death, and violence, including violence against women, children and the elderly. According to the Ministry, these representations had compromised on ‘good taste and decency’.
It has strongly advised all private television channels to attune their systems and practices of reporting incidents of crime, accidents and violence, including death in conformity with the Programme Code.
According to the Ministry, television channels have shown dead bodies of individuals and images/videos of injured people with blood splattered around, people, including women, children and elderly being beaten mercilessly in close shots, continuous cries and shrieks of a child being beaten by a teacher, shown repeatedly over several minutes including circling the actions thereby making it even more ghastly, without taking the precaution of blurring the images or showing them from long shots. Additionally, it has highlighted that the manner of reporting such incidents is distasteful and distressing for the audience.
The advisory released by the Ministry highlighted the impact such reporting has on various audiences. It has also stated that such reports can have an adverse psychological impact on children. As per the Ministry’s observations, it is a crucial issue of invasion of privacy which could be potentially maligning and defamatory, the advisory has underlined. Television, being a platform usually watched by families in households with people from all cohorts – old aged, middle-aged, small children, among others, and with various socio-economic backgrounds, place a certain sense of responsibility and discipline among the broadcasters, which has been enshrined in the Programme Code and the Advertising Code, it further said.
The Ministry has observed that in most cases the videos were taken from social media and broadcast without editorial discretion or modifications to ensure compliance and consistency with the Programme Code. Such broadcasting includes instances such as showing distressing images and videos of a cricketer injured in an accident, without blurring, showing disturbing footage of a man dragging the dead body of a victim and also focusing on the face of the victim with blood splattered around, showing the distressing gory images of the dead body of a Punjabi singer without blurring, showing a disturbing incident of a man brutally beating two minor boys with a stick in Chirang district of Assam, showing a man hacking his own sister to death in Rajapalayam, Virudhunagar district of Tamil Nadu, among others.