Government of India issued guidelines regarding reporting of violent incidents

New Delhi. The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting today issued an advisory to all television channels against reporting of various incidents of violence, including accidents, deaths and violence against women, children and the elderly, which are “disgusting and indecent”. This advisory has been issued by the Ministry after several cases of indiscretion by television channels have come to its notice.

The Ministry has said that television channels have blurred or blurred the images/videos of people including dead bodies and bloodied injured people, women, children and the elderly being mercilessly thrashed, a child crying incessantly being thrashed by a teacher. Without taking care to show in distant shots, those movements are shown repeatedly for several minutes in close shots, making them even more terrifying by surrounding them. It has also come to light that this method of reporting such incidents is distasteful and disturbing to the viewers.

The consultation highlights the impact such reporting can have on different audiences. It has been said that such news can also have an adverse psychological effect on children. The consultation has also underlined the fact that there is also a significant issue of invasion of privacy which can be potentially libelous and defamatory. Being a platform commonly watched in homes by people from all strata of the family – old, middle-aged, young children etc. and people from different socio-economic backgrounds – a certain sense of responsibility and discipline is imposed on television broadcasters. generate, which are compiled into program code and advertising code.

The Ministry has observed that in most of the cases videos are being taken from social media and circulated without editorial discretion and modifications to ensure compliance and continuity of the Program Code.

Below is a list of examples of such content that has aired recently:

1. Painful pictures and videos of a cricketer who got injured in an accident on 30.12.2022 were shown without blurring.
2. On 28.08.2022, a painful footage was shown of a man dragging a dead body of a victim with blood splattered all around and focusing on the face of the victim.
3. In a painful incident dated 06-07-2022, a teacher in a coaching class in Bihar’s Patna can be seen mercilessly thrashing a five-year-old boy till he faints. The clip was played without muting in which the child’s painful screams begging for mercy could be heard and was shown for over 09 minutes.
4. On 04-06-2022 Painful pictures of the dead body of a Punjabi singer were shown without blurring.
5. A heart-wrenching incident of a man mercilessly beating two minor boys with a stick in Chirang district of Assam on 25-05-2022. In the video, the man can be seen mercilessly thrashing the boys with sticks. The clip was played without blurring or muting, in which the pained cries of the boys could be heard clearly.
6. On 16-05-2022, a woman advocate was brutally assaulted by her neighbor in Bagalkot district of Karnataka, which was shown continuously without editing.
7. A man is shown killing his own sister in Rajapalayam, Virudhunagar district of Tamil Nadu on 04-05-2022.
8. On 01-05-2022, in Bilaspur district of Chhattisgarh, a person was hanged upside down from a tree and brutally beaten with sticks by five people.
9. On 12-04-2022, painful visuals of five dead bodies in an accident were shown continuously without blurring.
10. In an incident dated 11-04-2022 a man was shown mercilessly attacking his 84 year old mother in Kollam, Kerala, dragging her and continuously beating her mercilessly for almost 12 minutes without blurring.
11. On 07-04-2022 a very disturbing video of an old man setting his son on fire was shown in Bangalore. Unedited footage of the old man lighting a matchstick and throwing it at his son was repeatedly circulated.
12. A video of a 14-year-old minor boy being thrashed in Morigaon district of Assam on 22-03-2022 was played without blurring or muting in which the boy can be heard crying and pleading as he is mercilessly thrashed.

Expressing concern over such telecasts and keeping in view the larger public interest involved and the nature of the audience of television channels including elderly, women and children, the Ministry has strictly advised all private television channels to That they bring their systems and practices for reporting incidents of crime, accidents and violence, including fatalities, in line with the Program Code.