Self-regulation best way forward: NCW on women's portrayal in

Pro-active participation of the government is needed in coming up with an appropriate legislation to monitor representation of women in media, the National Commission for Women today said as it underlined that self- regulation is the best way forward.

Several stakeholders of the media industry and government officials gathered here for a day-long consultation hosted by NCW on reviewing the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act, 1986 and offered suggestions to amend the law.

"It was agreed that no new law was needed. And, that existing law should be amended. The legislation should not mean policing, and we realised that self-regulation is the best way forward," NCW chief Lalitha Kumaramangalam told PTI.
 

The existing Act prohibits indecent representation of women through advertisements or in publications, writings, paintings, figures or in any other manner and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

Kumaramangalam said though a lot of questions are raised over women's representation in advertisements, "sadly, we did not have anyone turning up from that field."

"While we should have a self-regulatory model, some sort of pro-active participation from the government is needed in coming up with an effective model. The modified legislation should be doable and implementable," she said.

"During the consultation, we also felt the need that more media education is necessary, as the world is moving towards the Internet, where a lot of thing is available. So a proper sensitisation is necessary," she added.

The NCW chief said after this consultation, it will also try and host similar consultations in south and east regions.

"It is important to reach out to local fraternity as well. Many meaningful films are being made from these regions, so, we want to reach out to them too," she added.

"There is a lot of disconnect between urban and non-urban audience in response to portrayal of women, so while an item number is seen by a section of society as inappropriate, a wealthy, English-speaking class may call it liberating. So, we need to have a balanced perspective," she said.