Supreme Court: 'Blue Whale Game' is a National Problem; Broadcasters Must Generate Awareness.

The Supreme Court  has observed that the infamous Blue Whale game is a national problem while responding to a plea to ban the suicide game.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justices D Y Chandrachud, and A M Khanwilkar directed television industry to spread awareness about the deadly challenge. Television channels like Doordarshan and private television players were directed to telecast the danger related with the game in their prime time programmes. 
The recent development on the issue arose after the court asked Centre to constitute a panel of expert to come up with recommendations on how to block virtual dare games, like the Blue Whale challenge, which led to several suicidal deaths of children and adults across the country.

The court also asked the Centre to answer a plea seeking to firewall safeguards for deadly and violent online games like ‘Choking game’, ‘Salt and Ice Challenge’, ‘Fire Challenge’, ‘Cutting challenge’, ‘Eyeball challenge’ and ‘Human Embroidery game’.
Earlier, the govt told the Delhi High Court that a committee computer and other experts have been set up to probe cases of suicide allegedly caused by the Blue Whale challenge game, which is linked to the deaths of several children worldwide.
The Blue Whale Challenge is reportedly a suicide game in which the player is given certain tasks to complete over a period of 50 days and the final task leads him or her to commit suicide. The player is also asked to share photos after finishing each challenge.
More than six children across India in the age group of 12-19 years have taken their lives allegedly while playing this game within a span of two weeks, reports have said.
Deaths of teenagers have also been reported from other countries including Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Argentina, Bulgaria, Chile and Italy, the PIL has said.
The government had also said that it has issued directions to internet majors – Google, Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Microsoft and Yahoo to ensure that all links of Blue Whale and of similar games are immediately removed from their platforms.
The sudden popularity of the lethal online game, in which the final task requires the player to commit suicide, had forced the government to issue directions to the internet firms to remove its links.
Taking serious view of the Blue Whale Challenge game, the Madras High Court had on September 4 asked the Centre and the Tamil Nadu government to explore possibility of banning it.
The court scheduled the next hearing on November 20, 2017.