Pemra suspends two television channels’ transmission

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) Thursday suspended the transmission of two private news channels - ARY News and Bol News - for three days as they failed to employ time delay mechanism despite the directives of media watchdog.

Both channels continued to violate the orders of the authority, said Pemra in a statement.

With the aim of implementing the decisions of the higher judiciary and Pemra laws, the media regulatory authority had issued orders on September 05, instructing all channels to inform the authority about the progress/steps taken with regard to the effective time delay mechanism and the editorial board. The authority said it will issue orders for live or delayed broadcasting after verifying the measures. Hence, no channel will be allowed to directly cover public events during the period.

In the recent statement, Pemra stated that the authority had summoned chief executive officers of the said channels in person but they did not turn up rather they submitted their written replies.

In view of the written response and the seriousness of the matter, the authority suspended the broadcast of both of the channels for three days and communicated its decision to all cable and distribution networks.