NEW DELHI: While denying that there were any cases of obscenity in advertisements on Doordarshan, the Government recently said a total of forty-one instances of obscene advertisements on private television channels had been acted on between 2013 and 2016.

Information and Broadcasting Minister M. Venkaiaih Naidu said all programmes and advertisements of Doordarshan are telecast as per the Doordarshan broadcast/commercial code for advertising and in conformity of programme and advertising codes prescribed under the Cable Television Networks Rules 1994 enshrined under the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act 1995.

He told the Lok Sabha that while there was no pre-censorship of content telecast on private TV channels, there were adequate provisions to deal with violations.

The Act prescribes that all programmes and advertisements telecast on such TV channels should be in conformity with the prescribed Programme Code and Advertising Code enshrined in the Act and the rules framed thereunder. The codes contain parameters to regulate programmes and advertisements on TV channels including those which may contain obscene and vulgar programmes and advertisements.

He said there were 21 cases of obscenity in advertisements in 2013, five in 2014, eleven in 2015 and four in 2016.

In most cases, warnings and advisories were issued and in some cases apology scolls had to be run for a fixed period.