Indian country bans adult movies on TV

Adult movies will be banned from television in the Indian city of Mumbai and the state it’s in starting immediately, a two-judge panel ruled today.

Cable TV operators and satellite channels “must not telecast adult movies which are not suitable for unrestricted public exhibition,” said Justices R. M. Lodha and D. G. Karnik of the Mumbai High Court.

Cable operators and satellite channels can screen movies certified as U or “unrestricted” by the Indian Board of Film Certification, Lodha said.

He instructed police to confiscate the equipment of any operator violating the order of the Mumbai High Court – the highest court in the western state of Maharashtra, of which Mumbai is the capital.

The ban applies throughout the state.

Soon after the court’s ruling, petitioner Pratiba Naitthani said she had not “asked for censorship of television, but for a set of guidelines to regulate television.”

“A beginning has been made,” said Naitthani, a political science lecturer at Mumbai’s St. Xavier’s College. “You have censorship for movies in cinemas, so how can it be a free-for-all for adult movies on TV?”

Earlier, lawyer Iqbal Chagla led arguments against the ban, saying that since viewers pay for movie channels they could choose not to subscribe to networks screening “adult” movies. Chagla also said such movies were usually shown after 10pm.

However, Lodha said that “the Cable Television Networks Regulation Act (1994) is clear that adult films should not be shown on television.”

India’s prolific Hindi-language film industry, often called Bollywood is centred in Mumbai. The city is also India’s financial capital.