The court's direction came on a plea by Un-Canned Media Pvt Ltd.
The Centre has been asked by the Delhi High Court to examine the allegation that objectionable content, including soft pornography, was being made available for download from hotstar.com website, run by a subsidiary of Star India Pvt Ltd, and take appropriate action.
Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva issued notice to Star India and its subsidiary, Novi Digital Entertainment Pvt Ltd, seeking their reply to a plea alleging that they were operating an illegal Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) distribution platform without following the uplinking and downlinking guidelines.
Besides the two companies, the court also sought response of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting for allegedly not regulating content provided on the IPTV platform website hotstar.com. The court directed the ministries to "look into the issue and, in case, the content, being made available through the website hotstar.com is objectionable or prohibited, appropriate action shall be taken by them in accordance with law".
The court's direction came on a plea by Un-Canned Media Pvt Ltd, alleging that the two companies in connivance with each other, have been operating an illegal distribution platform, by illegally providing content through their Hotstar IPTV platform in violation of the guidelines stipulated under the applicable laws. It has contended that the company, which owns and operates digital properties like hotstar.com, is not being regulated by the ministries, in as much the contents being provided on the website is uncensored and uncontrolled by them.
Un-canned Media claimed the objectionable content was being made available for download by the companies. "Some instances have been pointed out whereby it is contended that even soft pornography is also being permitted to be downloaded from the services being provided by the firm on its website hotstar.com," the court noted in its order.
Hotstar has responded following Delhi HC's order to Centre. In an official communique they have stated, " We have been served with a copy of the Hon’ble Delhi High Court’s order dated November 11, 2016 and the pleadings basis which the order came to be passed. While it is not our practice to comment on matters which are sub-judice, we are compelled to provide certain factual clarifications at this stage. Hotstar is a leading destination for the consumption of entertainment and sports content. Hotstar absolutely does not provide any kind of pornographic content. The pleadings proceed on the basis that Hotstar is an IPTV service provider which is entirely incorrect. Like many others, globally and locally, like YouTube, Netflix, Voot, NDTV and Indiatimes, Hotstar is a video streaming platform providing content on demand. In any event, as the order has directed the MIB / DOT to look into the matter in accordance with law, we find no irregularity in providing these factual clarifications at this stage.”
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