Four members of the committee voted in favor of registering the initiative, five were against, two abstained.
The 22-member steering group was proposed by Kaunas City Council member Gintautas Labanauskas.
The politician from Kaunas wanted to call a referendum in support of the wording that "any information related with propagation of homosexuality" be banned on mass media before 10 PM.
The proposed wording was criticized by the parliamentary Legal Department, saying ghat the provision would be discriminatory and run counter to the Lithuanian Constitution and international conventions.
Labanausaks dismissed the legal conclusions as partial. "The observations are partial and redundant. In our opinion, we do not violate any laws or legal acts, furthermore, we do not restrict minority rights," said the politician.
Asked to specify what the propagation of homosexuality is, Labanauskas said there "should be no aggressive promotion of homosexuality."
He said he has not yet decided on taking the electoral authority's decision to court.
To call a referendum, initiators must collect signatures of at least 300,000 eligible voters within three months.
