CHENNAI: (MAHESWARI SRIRAM) The Centre should consider emulating Australia in imposing an internet ban for minors to prevent children aged below 16 from viewing pornographic content, said the Madras High Court.
In a public interest litigation, S Vijayakumar stated that pornographic content is freely circulating on internet platforms. Anyone, including children, can watch them and the future of children is being ruined as a result, he claimed.
Therefore, obscene videos should be blocked by invoking the powers under the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights Act, directions should be issued to the member-secretaries of the National and Tamil Nadu Commissions for Protection of Child Rights, the Secretaries of the Union Ministries of Information and Broadcasting, and Home Affairs, and the secretary of the Internet Service Providers Association, he said in the plea.
When the petition came up for hearing before Justices G Jayachandran and KK Ramakrishnan of the Madurai bench, senior counsel KPS Palanivel Rajan appeared for the petitioner and said internet service providers must block such content to prevent children from accessing them. Directions should be issued to initiate action under the Child Rights Protection Act, and awareness should be created among children, he submitted.
Appearing for the Internet Service Providers Association, Chevanan Mohan stated that, as per the Digital Media Intermediary Guidelines and Rules, appropriate measures are being taken and whenever complaints are received regarding obscene content, immediate action is taken against the concerned service providers and such videos are removed.
After hearing the submissions, the judges observed in their order that protecting children's rights and creating awareness regarding education is the primary duty of the National and State Child Rights Commissions. However, such awareness programmes are not being conducted frequently, they said.
Although the central government has, through an order in 2017, provided mechanisms to restrict controversial videos, effective software is required to completely prevent children from viewing obscene content, the bench noted.
It cited the example of Australia, where the government has imposed restrictions preventing children below 16 years from accessing the internet, and said similar measures should be considered by the central government. Until such time, the Union and State governments, along with Child Rights Commissions, must undertake awareness programmes for children on this issue, the court said.