The Government through the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has recently released draft guidelines (“Guidelines”), and solicited comments from the general public thereon, to ensure that people with visual and hearing impairment have improved access to experience public exhibition of films. Notably, the Central Board of Film Certification (“CBFC”) came out with an expression of interest last year to make digital exploitation platforms better accessible to people with disabilities, not long after the Delhi High Court passed an order directing for the OTT release of the film ‘Pathaan’ to have closed captioning, audio description and subtitles in Hindi language. While the Indian Government had introduced an act in 1995 addressing equal opportunities, participation and protection of rights of persons with disabilities and had replaced it with an updated version vide the Rights of Persons With Disabilities Act, 2016 (“Act”) to ensure compliance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), the release of these Guidelines entails an attempt to implement provisions of the Act in practice, especially to acknowledge the growing need to make cinema-going experience available to all.
The Guidelines apply to feature films certified by the CBFC and having a minimum duration of 72 minutes; and address the following salient features :
| (i) Objectives |
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| (ii) Modes of providing Accessibility Features |
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| (iii) Standards of Accessibility Features |
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The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 already require online curated content (including but not limited to feature films) to bear accessibility features such as subtitles, CC and AD. The introduction of the Guidelines is a welcome move, constituting an extension of similar mandates towards films certificated by the CBFC and subjected to theatrical exploitation. However, there may be some concerns associated with the practical implementation of the provisions. Some theatres may not have the infrastructure to allow installation of accessibility equipments such as AD-enabled seats, headphones, captioning mirrors, additional screens etc. within the premises as proposed in the Guidelines. Provisioning for dedicated shows for a hearing-impaired/visually-impaired audience could also constitute an operational difficulty. Furthermore, implementation of the Guidelines is likely to bring about a general rise in the cost of production and exploitation of films, caused inter-alia by creation of multiple versions of films, accommodating accessibility features within the films, hiring and shooting an ISL interpreter for incorporating sign language into the film, installation of new equipments at the theatres, scheduling dedicated shows, hiring and training theatre-staff to be adept at attending to customers with disabilities etc. This may be a challenge especially for regional film industries that often function with an already constrained budget. It will nevertheless be interesting to see how producers and exhibitors give effect to the terms in the near future.
