NEW DELHI: Action has been initiated ten times against eight foreign television channels in 2011 and 2012 for violation of the Programme and Advertising Codes under the Cable Television Network (Regulation) Act, 1995 and the rules framed thereunder.

Information and Broadcasting minister Manish Tewari told Parliament however that the Act does not provide for pre-censorship of the programmes and advertisements.

While FTV faced closure for ten days from 28 March this year, the AXN channel was taken off for one day. The other channels which were issued advisories or warnings included Sony Pix, Sony, TLC, and Zee Trends.

Sony Entertainment Television (SET) apologised for telecasting the promos of an adult film and the matter was closed, the violation by TCM TV for showing an adult film without displaying the Censor Certificate is under consideration. Star Cricket was pulled up for airing ad of a liquor brand.

An Electronic Media Monitoring Centre (EMMC) has been set up to monitor the content of private TV channels. The Ministry also has an Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) to consider the cases of violation of these codes and recommend appropriate course of action.

The Press Council of India (PCI) formed ?Norms of Journalistic Conduct? for adherence by the print media and the Council takes cognizance of the contents in print media which are violative of the Norms. However, PCI does not have any information in regard to violation of the Norms by foreign media companies.

NEW DELHI: Information and Broadcasting Ministry is keeping a check on all the international channels that are downlinking in India.

The ministry sources told indiantelevision.com that the Electronic Media Monitoring Cell (EMMC) is closely monitoring all the 89 channels from abroad which had so far been permitted to downlink in India.

Of these channels, 33 channels are beaming exclusively in English while another 33 are beaming in English, Hindi and one or more regional languages.

While 15 are beaming in English and Hindi, two channels are in Japanese and English, two in French, and one each in Korean-English, German-English, Tamil, and Hindi.

Since the channels are beamed by companies having a registered office in India, they are also covered under the Cable TV Networks (Regulations) Act 1995, the Inter-Ministerial Committee which is empowered to act on complaints as well as suo motu, and the self-regulation mechanisms of the private channels - the Broadcasting Content Complaints Council, and the News Broadcasting Regulatory Authority.