The country is going through a great “moral crisis” with the increase in the frequency of obscene and vulgar advertisements in electronic and print media which is leading to perversion among young boys who in turn harass women, Samajwadi Party MP Ramgopal Yadav said on Wednesday during Zero Hour in Rajya Sabha.
“I can’t even watch news with my family because such obscene and vulgar advertisements are interspersed in news programmes too,” Mr. Yadav told the Upper House.
Going a step further, Mr. Yadav quoted from A Study of History by Arnold J. Toynbee, saying the “London University Professor had noted that civilisations have disintegrated because of nudity and alcoholism. And both these trends are spreading in our country at a rapid rate.”
He used the occasion to take a dig at the Narendra Modi government: “You promised to remove Article 370 instead you dropped IPC 377,” he said.
Article 370 of the Indian Constitution accords special status to the state of Jammu and Kashmir, while Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code made homosexuality illegal in India.
Mr. Yadav called wardrobe malfunction during fashion shows as deliberate. “All this incites perversion in boys and leads to harassment of women,” he added.
Replying to Mr. Yadav’s submission, Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar conceded that it was a serious situation. “We have a mechanism to redress complaints on this issue which has so far settled 6,700 complaints. But we need a more effective redressal mechanism and we are working on the same,” he added.
