Nagpur :-The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) while calling for a monitoring mechanism for social media and OTT platforms said that whatever was being served on these platforms in the name of freedom of expression, is undesirable. BC Bhartia, National President and Praveen Khandelwal, Secretary General of the CAIT said that it is also necessary to block these social media platforms from taking advantage of “intermediaries” under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act because even if a complaint is found to be correct, these social platforms will get themselves saved under the guise of section 79 of the IT Act by terming themselves as intermediaries and the efforts of the government to form a complaint panel will prove to be useless. In the past, these platforms and various companies of different sectors have taken recourse to this provision and shied away from the complaints against them.
Bhartia and Khandelwal also strongly demanded the Government to take similar steps for OTT platforms immediately where obscenity is at its peak and there is no mechanism in India to monitor or watch them.
Bhartia and Khandelwal said that we should not forget that all these social media platforms are puppets in the hands of foreign companies and dance at their behest whereas in a country like India where culture and civilization keeps prevailing all the time, these social platforms have directly hurt Indian traditions and notorious and unsocial elements have been using them according to their wish in an unbridled way and in the absence of any complaint mechanism, all voice are going unheard. In a way, they are waging war on our ancient culture, which needs to be stopped immediately.
Bhartia and Khandelwal said that earlier the cinema was the only tool for giving messages to the society and to protect it from giving unwanted messages, the Censor Board was set up so that the country’s culture, civilization and ancient heritage are preserved. Due to the abundant use of technology, social media platforms are now being used on a large scale and have become a strong messenger in the country. In such a situation, belatedly, but taking a very good step, the government has formed committees for complaints against these platforms, which in a way will be very effective in containing the spread of rumors or false propaganda in the larger interest of the Country.
Bhartia and Khandelwal said that our country is going to become the youngest country in the world and it has been seen that few of the ill will forces in a very clandestine manner are trying to confuse our youth and also attempting to intoxicate our youth and therefore, the step taken by the government in this direction is a welcome step.
