New Delhi: The Indian government on Monday told the Supreme Court that it wanted to ban child pornography websites, but expressed its inability to go beyond that and don the role of moral police.

Addressing the apex court bench headed by Chief Justice HL Dattu, attorney general Mukul Rohatgi told the court that the state cannot be present in every household to check what people were watching in private and interfere with their entertainment.

Telling the court that there has to be some self regulation to check the viewing of porn websites, the AG told the court that the state could not be totalitarian.

The AG said this to the court in the course of the hearing of a petition seeking a total clampdown on websites showing pornography.