After child rights body NCPCR raised concerns over “indecent content” involving mothers and sons on YouTube, the Maharashtra Police on Thursday filed a case against YouTube India in connection with the videos.
The operator of a specific YouTube channel has also been charged under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) for posting mother-son “challenge videos”.
The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has asked YouTube India’s government affairs and public policy head, to appear before it in person on January 15 with a list of such channels.
According to sources, the ‘challenge videos’ featured indecent acts between mothers and sons, such as kisses, between mothers and adolescent sons.
NCPCR chief Priyank Kanoongo has written a letter to Mira Chatt, YouTube’s head of government affairs and public policy in India.
In the letter, Kanoongo said the commission had taken cognisance of an alarming trend on YouTube channels with challenges portraying potentially indecent acts involving mothers and sons.
Speaking to India Today TV, Kanoongo said, “Several challenge videos on YouTube featuring mothers and sons violate the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act, 2012.”
“YouTube will have to fix this. Offenders will have to go to jail. The commercialisation of such videos is like selling porn. Any platform which features videos where children have been sexually abused will have to go to jail,” he added.