Supreme Court Gets Tough: Notice to Centre, OTTs Over Porn Content, Ban Likely Soon

The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to the Center, OTT and social media platforms on a PIL seeking direction to take appropriate steps to ban streaming of pornographic content. A bench of Justices BR Gavai and AG Masih observed that the petition has raised an issue of concern and sought response from Netflix, Amazon Prime, Alt Balaji, Ullu, ALTT, X, Meta Inc, Google, Mubi, Apple and others on a PIL seeking regulation of pornographic content on OTT platforms and social media.

Advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain, appearing for the petition, highlighted the issue of content being aired on OTT platforms and social media without any regulation or investigation. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Center, said that obscene content was present even in some daily programs.

Government's warning to OTT platform

Mehta said that there should not be censorship, but some degree of regulation is necessary. He further said, 'Some regulation exists, some are under consideration.' The bench said in its order, 'This petition shows a significant concern regarding the display of many objectionable, obscene and vulgar content on OTT platforms and social media.' The Solicitor General has said that obscene content crosses the limit. He said that notice should be issued in this regard.

These platforms will have to be reined in

The bench also said that the issue raised in the petition is a policy matter, it is in the policy area of ​​the Central Government. Petitioners Uday Mahurkar, Sanjeev Newar, Sudeshna Bhattacharya Mukherjee, Shatabdi Pandey and Swati Goyal approached the apex court. The PIL filed against Netflix, Amazon, Alt Balaji and others attacks the distribution of pornographic content through Over The Top (OTT) streaming platforms.

Directions sought in the petition

The petition seeks directions to the Centre to take appropriate steps to prohibit the streaming of sexually explicit, obscene, child sexual abuse, incest and similar content including nudity, X-rated scenes etc on OTT platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, Ullu, ALTT etc and social media platforms including X, Meta, Instagram, YouTube etc.