Recently, some media reports had claimed that the Central Government is going to relax the warning related to smoking on OTT platforms. Now, in a response, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has called such reports misleading and fake. The government has clearly said that the rules and regulations related to cigarettes and tobacco products (COTP) on OTT will continue.
“A reputed news publication has recently made a claim that the Union Government has reached “an uneasy compromise” with OTT (over-the-top) streaming services on adding smoking warnings to their content. The report further claims that some platforms have chosen less intrusive warnings as a result of such an agreement. The news report is misinformed and claims are false, misleading and based on misrepresented facts,” said the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
The Ministry further said: “Considering public health as a priority issue, the Government of India has extended the COTP (Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products) film rules to OTT platform also. OTT rules 2023 became operative from 1st September 2023. Under these rules, now all OTT platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney + Hotstar, Jio Cinema, Sony LIV, ALTBalaji, Voot etc. have to display anti- tobacco health spots, anti- tobacco health warning as a prominent static message and audio-visual disclaimer on the ill-effect of tobacco use as prescribed in the rules.”
With this, the Government of India has made it clear that there is no such relaxation with smoking warnings for OTT platforms.