The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) on Saturday said that it has been constantly engaged in eliminating the menace of obscenity and vulgarity from broadcast media and cable TV networks and prompt actions are taken against the licensees as whenever any such incident comes to light.
“PEMRA, during last one year, has seized 713 cable TV networks on such complaints and fine worth Rs 2.176 million recovered from them. Nearly 87 different illegal channels on cable networks have been taken off and 7 cable TV licences have been revoked,” a spokesman for the PEMRA said. Similarly, he added, 17 TV channels were fined a total sum of Rs. 18 million for violating Code of Conduct, six TV channel licences were cancelled and one was suspended. He said that mere than 300 warnings/notices were served to TV channels and they were called for personal hearings. He strongly reacted to the claim of former chief of Jamaat-e-lslami, Qazi Hussain Ahmed as appeared in some sections of the press, who had alleged that the PEMRA was hapless in curbing indecency and vulgarity in electronic media. The PEMRA actions against vulgarity were challenged by its licensees in the courts which granted stay orders.
Incidentally, most of the stays orders are granted without providing any opportunity of hearing to the PEMRA. As long as the matters are pending before the courts, the PEMRA is unable to take any action to implement its laws,” he added.
The PEMRA official clarified that the generalised complaint lodged by the former JI chief and Justice (retd) Wajihuddin Ahmed regarding vulgarity in electronic media contained no specific detail of incidents or programmes or names of channels to be particularly probed. However, he added, in response to such complaints, a meeting of Council of Complaints Islamabad was called on July 2, 2012 and complainants were requested to appear before it to supplicate their complaint. However, neither any complainant nor did any of their representatives appear on the given date, which revealed their non-seriousness in pleading the complaint, said the spokesman. He said the PEMRA furnished its comments to the apex court, enlisting the actions initiated on this account which has been duly published in the mainstream print media. It is worth mentioning that all the objectionable foreign and unlicensed channels have been off-aired on cable networks and legal actions are taken if any such incident is reported, he added. “The initiatives amply substantiate that the PEMRA is not sitting idle and has been discharging its functions diligently within its ambit and resources,” concluded the spokesman.
