RIYADH, Aug 6: Irked by a ban on Arab TV channels, ‘apparently under the Israeli pressure’, the Saudi daily Arab News in a front page report has criticised the Indian government for the unannounced ban.

In a country widely referred to as the world’s largest democracy, Indian government has succumbed to the Israeli pressure and ordered a nationwide ban on the broadcast of Arab television channels, the newspaper said.

The story pointed out: “The Indian government’s ban on Arab television stations is in complete contrast to the friendship that Arab countries imagine exists with their neighbours across the Arabian Sea.”

The report says that Nabila Al-Bassam, a Saudi businesswoman on a trip to Mumbai, told the newspaper how she became exasperated at not being able to watch Arab channels at a leading five-star hotel of Mumbai.

When she took up the issue with the hotel manager, she was told that Arab television channels had been banned across India.

A perplexed Al-Bassam sent an SMS to Arab News Editor-in-Chief Khaled Al Maeena to verify whether this was indeed the case. “Oberoi Hotel tells me that the government of India has banned all Arab TV channels. Why? I hate watching CNN and BBC,” she wrote to Mr Almaeena.