With a goal to address issues of sensitive video content and fake news, the Narendra Modi government has chosen to bring in a self-regulation law in digital media including Over-the-top (OTT) stages and news sites.
It is accounted for that the ministry of information and broadcasting has chosen to outline an overall rule under which the digital media can self-regulate itself after the issue was taken up at the most elevated levels.
“Like the print media has the Press Council of India, films have the Central Board of Film Certification and TV channels are broadly regulated under The Cable Television Networks Regulation Act, the digital media which has been unregulated till now will soon have an overarching regulation for redressal of complaints on content,” the official said.
In India, the market size of OTT stages is near Rs 1,000 crore with around 20 crore users. While countless them are free, a portion of the OTT stages have yearly membership fees to access their content.
The I&B service has been getting complaints from general society over the grown-up substance and language appeared in OTT stages.
On 13 January, the parliamentary standing committee on information technology with respect to strategies to manage and impose reasonable restrictions on content on OTT platforms.
In September 2020, leading domestic and international over the top (OTT) content providers operating in India have adopted an ombudsman based self-regulation model to address grievances of the users and viewers.
Altogether, 15 OCCPs have endorsed into the self-regulation pact. These incorporate Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney Hotstar, Jio Cinema, Zee5, Viacom18, MX Player, Alt Balaji, Arre, Eros Now, HoiChoi, Hungama, Shemaroo, Discovery Plus and Flickstree.