New Delhi: A strongly-worded advisory from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has asked television channels to stop using “unparliamentary language”, “making false claims” and “misquoting agencies” in their news coverage.
A list of episodes mentioned in the advisory released Saturday highlighted examples of fake news and content that could be potentially incendiary content.
Although the ministry has been blocking YouTube channels for fake news content — it has banned 78 so far — what sets this advisory apart is this is one of the rare occasions when mainstream media has been pulled up for its content.
The advisory begins with a description of section 20 of The Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995, which provides the central government to take action against a channel or a programme.
The notification said that the ministry could deny permission to uplink and downlink to a channel that shows “criticism of friendly countries; contains attack on religions or communities or visuals or words contemptuous of religious groups or which promote communal attitudes”.
“Uplink” and “downlink” are terms used to link to a communication satellite.
The ministry cited two examples — the media coverage for the recent riots in northwest Delhi and the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
“Channels have been making false claims and frequently misquoting international agencies/actors,” the advisory said. “Use of ‘scandalous headlines/taglines’ that are completely unrelated to the news item. Many of the journalists and news anchors of these channels made fabricated and hyperbolic statements intending to incite the audiences.”
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‘Provocative headlines, videos of violence’
The ministry advised news channels to stop using language that “may incite communal hatred among the communities and disrupt peace and law and order”. It also said “provocative headlines and videos of violence” that were floated around about the Jahangirpuri riots.
“These would be discontinued at the earliest,” the advisory said.
“There is a red line which should not be crossed,” I&B ministry secretary Apurva Chandra told ThePrint. “Action can be taken under provisions of CTN act for violations of the Progamme Code.”
Last month, several YouTube news channels were banned over fake news detected by the intelligence agencies.
‘Reporting on Russia-Ukraine conflict’
The advisory cites examples of headlines such as ‘Ukraine mein Atomi Hadkamp’ (Nuclear earthquake in Ukraine) and ‘Parmanu Putin se pareshan Zelenski’ (Zelenskyy scared of ‘nuclear’ Putin) in its advisory.
Debates over nuclear bombs and “unverified claims” on war were deemed “exploitative and scandalous ‘war promoting’” content, the advisory said.
According to the sources in the ministry, “fabricated pictures” and fake news “have been a constant concern for officers and should be stopped as it does not make us look very intelligent as a nation”.
The advisory also highlights the hyperbolic language used by anchors in these debates.
“Anchors of many of these channels talk in hyperbole and make factually wrong comments even misquoting other sources. One such news titled ‘Mariupol Finished! Full and final’,” the advisory read.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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