18 OTT platforms blocked over vulgar content, says Govt

The Ministry said a major chunk of the content on these platforms portrayed women in a demeaning manner. “It depicted nudity and sexual acts in various inappropriate contexts, such as relationships between teachers and students, incestuous family relationships, etc,” the statement said.

“The content included sexual innuendos and, in some instances, prolonged segments of pornographic and sexually explicit scenes devoid of any thematic or societal relevance,” it added.

The Ministry said the decision to act against the OTT platforms was taken under the provisions of the Information Technology Act, 2000 in consultation with other Ministries/departments, and domain experts specialising in media and entertainment, women’s rights, and child rights.

It said these OTT platforms extensively utilised social media to disseminate trailers, specific scenes, and external links aimed at attracting audiences to their websites and apps.

One of these OTT apps had more than one crore downloads, while two others had over 50 lakh downloads, the statement said, adding that the social media accounts of these OTT platforms together had over 32 lakh users.

In November 2023, The Indian Express had reported that the Ministry planned a massive crackdown on OTT platforms hosting obscene content, and for the first time, had ordered three platforms – Hunters, Besharams and Prime Play – to take down such content or face action.

Notices were issued in the last week of October regarding violation of the IT Rules, 2021, and other laws related to obscenity and vulgarity, including Sections 67 (publishing or transmitting obscene material) and 67A (publishing or transmitting of material containing sexually explicit act) of the IT Act, 2000. The platforms were given five days to ensure compliance.

According to sources, the I&B Ministry has been dealing with a rising number of complaints regarding vulgarity on OTT platforms. While there are 57 registered OTT platforms at present, most of these complaints pertain to unregistered platforms that have mushroomed in recent years.

“The government is serious about the complaints of increasing abusive and obscene content on OTT platforms. If there is a need to make any changes to the rules over this, the ministry will consider it… The government won’t back down from taking necessary action,” Thakur said recently.

Currently, there is no framework in place for censorship of OTT content. However, the new Broadcasting Services (Regulation) Bill, 2023, provides for a consolidated framework to regulate all content, including direct-to-home (DTH), Internet Protocol Television (IPTV), OTT broadcasting and digital news.