Centre to introduce law to regulate digital media

Jaipur, November 24

Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur has said the Centre is working on a bill to regulate digital media.

He said there used to be one-way communication of news earlier, but with the development of electronic and digital media, communication of news has become multidimensional.

Now even small news of a village reaches the national platform through digital media, he said on Wednesday.

In a statement, Thakur said the government had left most of the print, electronic and digital media to self-regulation.

“Digital media presents opportunities as well as challenges. To have a fine balance, the government will see what can be done on this.

“I would say that changes have to be brought in law, we will bring that to make your work simple and easy. We are working to introduce a bill,” Thakur said at an event organised by Hindi news daily ‘Mahanagar Times’.

Thakur said the process of registration of newspapers would be simplified and the central government would soon bring a new law to replace the 1867 Press and Registration of Books Act.

Under the new law, it will be possible to complete the registration process, which now takes about four months, in a week through online mode.