‘Verification’ before closing online portals

As the registration process is underway, the Information and Broadcasting Department will apply to the court for 'verification and sorting' before the closure of all online portals. Information and Broadcasting Minister Hasan Mahmud hinted so while answering at a question to reporters at the secretariat on Wednesday. "The country doesn't need so many online portals," he said. It is not appropriate to exist so many online portals. We have heard the court order to shut down online portals in the media. We haven’t yet received a notice. We will shut down some online portals within the time limit if the court orders. I will also bring to the notice of the court that registration is an ongoing process. It is also a matter of wondering how appropriate it is to shut them all down without checking and sorting. We will tell this to the court.' The information minister said, “We have heard the court order, we have learned about it through the media. We have not yet received the official copy. Online registration is an ongoing process and will continue to be so in the future. People may apply for registering new portals six months later, one year later or five years later. It is not a matter of not getting any online registration in the future except for those who have got registration now. There are no such rules. Or there is no rule that the papers that are available today will not be published in the future. It's an ongoing process.” He added, 'Some online portals will be shut down within the time limit set by the court. “We will definitely shut down some of the online portals as per the time limit set by the court after we get the written order of the court. However, in the future you have to register online. This is what we are doing through a process. We will take the matter to court. Earlier on August 16, the court had issued a rule asking why no 'ethical policy' should be formulated for the journalists of online newspapers. At the same time, according to the 'National Online Mass media Policy 2017', why unauthorized and unregistered online newspapers in the country will not be ordered to close. The rule also asked why the waiting unregistered newspapers would not be instructed to be registered.