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indiantelevision.com Team
NEW DELHI: Even as Star One has announced the second edition of the programme to be aired shortly, the Delhi High Court today upheld the show cause notice issued by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry on the telecast of two episodes (17 and 21 July 2009) of the controversial TV reality show " Sach Ka Saamna" by Star Plus.
Justice S. Muralidhar turned down the plea of Star India, and said that the content shown in the programme was "vulgar, indecent and against good taste and decency".
He said the programme where certain individual volunteers agree to sit on the hotseat after having gone through a lie detector test violated the Programme Code prescribed under the Cable Television Network Rules.
Star Plus had on 27 November 2009 been issued a warning by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry for using language that was vulgar, indecent and against good taste and decency in its programme ?Sach Ka Saamna? through the questions by presenter Rajeev Khandelwal or the answers by the various personalities on the show after a notice issued to the channel on 22 July that year and a personal hearing given later on 8 September the same year.
The Ministry had said the channel should keep Indian ethos and culture in mind while formatting programmes, and enjoined upon it to strictly adhere to this guideline.
The warning was issued under the Uplinking Guidelines, the terms and conditions of the permission granted and the provisions of Section 20 of the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995, asking the channel to strictly adhere to the Programme Code prescribed under the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act 1995 and Rules framed thereunder. .
The Channel had been issued a show cause notice for telecast/re-telecast of the programme on 17 July and 21 July as the contents of the programme appeared vulgar, indecent and against good taste and decency. It was observed that the anchor of the above programme sought replies to questions regarding infidelity, incest and other subjects that were not suitable for unrestricted public exhibition, especially keeping in view the Indian ethos and culture.
The questions and replies followed by a polygraph test, resulted in great embarrassment not only to the participants and their families but also to the viewers watching the programme along with their families. The questions appeared offending against good taste and decency; contained obscene words, appeared to malign and slander segments of social, public and moral life of the country and were not found suitable for unrestricted public exhibition.
The Inter Ministerial Committee (IMC) constituted by the Ministry to look into the complaints against violation of Programme and Advertising Codes had previewed the recording of the show and also considered the reply submitted by the channel before coming to its conclusion. It felt that the programmes were not suitable for unrestricted public exhibition. The channel violated Rule 6 (1) (a), (d), (i) and (o) of the Cable Television Networks Rules, 1994 as amended from time to time.
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