Information and Broadcasting Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said today that a regulatory body should be set up if broadcasters fail to exercise control in the content. ‘‘My first aim is to depend on self-control. If that fails then there should be a professional body set up by a statutory measure. There is need to have a mechanism,’’ he said at a press conference here. He said television needed to exercise control in showing events like riots and terrorist attacks live on television channels. ‘‘A riot is news but it is also a curse for society. Why should a riot be shown live? Why do you have to say Hindu and Muslim? We have to draw a line when covering such events. There should be some lakshman rekha,’’ he said. ‘‘During Akshardam, everything was shown live including how many commandos have been brought in. If terrorists had a mobile phone they would know exactly what is happening outside.’’ He said that when planes crashed into the WTC, broadcasters in the US didn’t show rows of bodies. ‘‘It’s not done anywhere in the world. All channels in India should focus on these issues,’’ he said at a press conference at Doordarshan Patna. Clarifying that he did not believe in moral policing, he said incidents like MTV apologising for showing Mahatma Gandhi in a poor light shouldn’t happen. He also said the issue of uplinking of foreign channels like Star News would be placed before the Cabinet and the decision would be taken then.
