Broadcasters oppose news content regulation; Govt wants Bill soon

New Delhi, Jul 20 (UNI) Broadcasters today strongly opposed the provision of the regulation of news content that forms part of the draft Broadcasting Services Regulation Bill, most likely coming in the monsoon session of Parliament.

Representatives of private TV news channels told the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting that the news was broadcast only after its was examined by their editors, so there was no need for another regulator, Secretary Asha Swarup told reporters here.

She said the broadcasters were not averse to the idea of regulator as such, but had reservations over regulation of the news content.

Earlier, the Ministry made two presentations to the broadcasters on the content code and the broadcasting bill in a bid to get their feedbank on the subject before introducing the Bill in the monsoon session.

They have been given 15 days more time to send their final views as per the Ministry's frequent pronouncements that it would explore all avenues to get the stakeholders' views before going ahead with the Bill.

The cap on cross media ownership proposed in the earler draft of the bill, which had also been opposed by braodcasters, was also discussed in today's meeting after the presentations were made.

A few days ago, at a television conference addressed by the Secretary, Information and Broadacsting, some broadcasters had expressed fears about the proposed regulator turning into another government department in effect.

The Secretary had stressed on self-regulation, but said such a regulator was needed for those who fail to observe restraint and dish out a kind of news more likely to create sensation than serve any public interest.

She had also said that the Government was not opposed to sting operation, but they would have to be justified by the public interest they serve.

UNI