The Madras High Court on Wednesday has ordered the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) to respond to a petition asking for a ban on the reality TV show Bigg Boss Tamil. The petition filed by advocate Sudhan has asked for the TV show to be certified by the IBF before being telecast. He has claimed in the petition that the contestants on the show “dressed up glamorously and spoke double meaning dialogues, affecting youngsters and audiences".

Justice Manikumar and Subramaniam Prasad who heard the petition observed that it was not right to claim that the show had obscene content even before it aired. Posting the next hearing in two weeks, they ordered the IBF to file their response to the petition in the meantime. The respondents listed on the petition are the government of Tamil Nadu, DGP, the Commissioner of Police, Chennai, the television channel (Vijay TV), Endemol, the producers of the show, and Kamal Haasan, the host.

Bigg Boss Tamil Season 3 is set to begin this Sunday, June 23, on Vijay TV. Fans of the show are eagerly awaiting the list of contestants that will be revealed on the said date.

To be hosted by actor turned politician Kamal Haasan once again, the show runs for 60 minutes on week days and 90 minutes during the weekend. While the first season was won by Arav, Riythvika emerged victorious in Bigg Boss Tamil 2.

In June last year, the Film Employees Federation of South India (FEFSI) had objected to this show being aired as over 90 percent of the workers employed do not belong to the union. Following this, the FEFSI has demanded that the show be stopped.

While the first two seasons had 19 and 17 contestants respectively, season 3 will have 15 housemates. The tagline for this season is ‘This is not only a show... It is our life’ and is expected to have its finale on October 6.