The Indian government issued an advisory to all private TV channels on Monday regarding grisly coverage of cricketer Rishabh Pant’s road accident and some other shocking news.
In its warning, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting instructed the channels to strictly follow the program code laid out under the relevant law.
Citing as examples the coverage of the Pant’s car crash, airing distressing images of dead bodies and the thrashing of a five-year-old boy, the ministry said that such reporting offends "good taste and decency".
"...television channels have shown dead bodies of individuals and images/videos of injured persons 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," read the advisory.
The ministry’s advisory further stated that the broadcasters had taken video clips and images from social media and "little effort has been made to modulate or attune or edit such clips so as to make it compliant and consistent with the spirit of the Programme Code."
The ministry "strongly advised" television channels to moderate their systems and practices of reporting incidents of crime, accidents, and violence, including death, in conformity with the Programme Code laid out under the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act.