Indian Government Plans IT Regulatation

BOMBAY — India’s information and broadcasting minister Sushma Swaraj said that she would like to control and regulate the Internet if is technically feasible.

The government of India is planning to form Media Council. India’s Press Council, which regulates newspapers and magazines, and the Film Censor Board, which governs movies, will be merged into the Council. The legislation creating the council was expected to be passed this year, she said. The Council would control television too, said Swaraj.

“We would like to regulate Internet, naturally, because it is another media, like TV, like print. When we constitute the Media Council, if the feasibility is there, only then would include the Internet in it,” Swaraj announced at a meeting of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of South Asia.

Swaraj said that the legislation might include some penal authority for the Media Council “to give it teeth.” She added that she would prefer the council, rather than the ministry, punish media, which violate the regulations.