Defense Ministry to censor army content in web-series after 'XXX Uncensored' controversy

The Ministry of Defence has written a letter to the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) to ask the production houses to obtain an NOC (No Objection Certificate) for the movies and web series made on the Indian army. 

In the letter, the ministry has stated that there are movies and web series which are distorting the image of the Indian Army. "It has been brought to the notice of this Ministry that some production houses. making films on Army theme are using contents which are distorting the image of the Indian Army.

Therefore. the producers of movies/web series etc based on Army theme may be advised to obtain the NOC from Ministry of Defence before the of any movie' documemary on Army theme in public domain. They may also be advised to ensure that any incident which distorts the image of the Defence Forces or hurts their sentiment may be prevented," reads the letter written by the ministry to the CBFC.

It may be recalled that the Ministry of Defence had received complaints over some objectionable scenes in the web series like Code M on Zee 5 and XXX Uncensored (season-2) on ALT Balaji. It had rubbed the concerned ex-servicemen associations the wrong way which claimed that the content was tarnishing the image of the Indian army. 

A letter has been sent to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology for considering the grey area over the online content. In March 2020, The Government of India had given 100 days to the OTT platform to set up an adjudicatory body urging the platforms to finalise a code of conduct.