Cultural boycott: Pemra chief calls for ban on Indian content

Says summary recommending the move has been sent to federal govt

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) Chairman Absar Alam on Tuesday called for a halt in airing Indian content on Pakistani TV channels as India was also not allowing Pakistani content on its TV channels.

Participating in a discussion titled ‘A debate of Foreign Content on Pakistani Entertainment Channels’, he said Pakistan should give matching response to India by banning Indian content on its TV channels. In this connection, he said a summary had been sent to the federal government in which it is clearly recommended that transmission of Indian channels and content should be subject to permission of airing Pakistani content by India.

“These recommendations will result in complete ending of the policy introduced in the era of General Pervez Musharraf and will promote Pakistani media industry,” he said.



The airing of Indian content was allowed by the government of Shaukat Aziz and now only federal government can take a decision on it. Till the annulment of this decision, television channels, FM radios and cable operators will be restricted to broadcasting only six per cent of their transmission as Indian content.

Pemra has decided to immediately close the channels airing foreign content after October 15, that too without giving any show cause notice, Alam said, adding that an awareness campaign would soon be launched on media against airing foreign content on TV channels.

Responding to a question, he said Pemra is in contact with all federal and provincial governments and is determined to make the campaign of banning Indian Direct to Home (DTH) successful and effective.

Pemra also announced a policy regarding landing rights. Under the new policy, fees will be considerably decreased and all phases will be made easy so that more international channels can be aired in Pakistan and viewers can get better quality entertainment.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2016.