Caretaker govt banned X on ‘compliance issues’: Tarar informs Senate Panel

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar on Wednesday informed the Senate Standing Committee on Information that all the social media platforms are active in the country except “X” which was banned over the “compliance issues”.

The decision to this effect was taken by the caretaker government, said the minister while responding to such a query of Senator Barrister Ali Zafar who presided over the Senate Panel.

He said the Ministry of Interior had submitted its reply to the Islamabad High Court regarding the ban on X formerly Twitter. “The matter is with the court which will take an appropriate decision in this regard,” he hoped.

“There is no restriction on Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat and LinkedIn which are being used by the common man posting all kinds of content,” he noted.

The chairman committee underlined the need for ensuring provision of fundamental rights to all the citizens. “Freedom of expression is the basic right of every citizen as enshrined in the Constitution,” he added.

READ: X banned over failure to adhere to Pakistan’s ‘lawful directives’, IHC told

Senator Ali stressed on devising a mechanism in collaboration with the Information Ministry which would not only ensure dissemination of correct information to the people about the government departments but also help them get their issues resolved.

In the standing committee meeting, Senator Irfan Siddiqui said steps should be taken to discourage misuse of the freedom of expression as false and fabricated news were rife on the social media networking sites.

Senator Jam Muhammad called for a strategy to curb fake news, misinformation and disinformation in the country. The social media sites should be used to pursue the national interests, he added.

Senator Pervez Rasheed not only regretted propaganda on such sites but also condemned the derogatory language being used by some elements.

The minister called for taking an initiative to curb crimes being committed in the digital domain, regretting there was currently no mechanism to tackle the issue of deepfake.

He said the federal cabinet had taken up a proposal to establish a Digital Rights Protection Authority and formed a committee which was headed by Rana Sanaullah with the information and IT ministers its members.

In response to a query of Senator Pervez Rasheed, the minister said the ministry had a strict criterion for evaluating films.

“There is a need to promote entertainment in the country,” he said while stressing on taking the initiatives imperative for encouraging the film industry.

Under the Film Finance Fund established by the government, he said, prominent film producers were requested to float ideas for producing quality movies.

He said the local film industry should not be affected with the screening of the foreign films.

As regards the health insurance scheme for the journalists and media workers, he said the health insurance scheme for journalists and media workers was started during the government of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), he said, highlighting the initiatives taken by the incumbent government for reviving the scheme.

He said the federal government would fully cover the health insurance of journalists in Islamabad.

In the first phase, 5,000 journalists and media workers would get the insurance, he said, adding collectively 30,000 would benefit from the scheme in the entire country.