The Supreme Court on Monday directed comedians Samay Raina, Vipun Goyal, Balraj Paramjeet Singh Ghai, Sonali Thakkar a.k.a. Sonali Aditya Desai and Nishant Jagdish Tanwar to apologise to the people with disabilities for making insensitive jokes about them.
Hearing a plea filed by SMA Cure Foundation, a bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi also asked the comedians to publish their apology on their YouTube channels and social media accounts.
The bench said that it will also decide on penalties to be paid by the comedians at the next hearing.
The apex court observed that while humour is well taken, it can’t be at the expense of anyone’s honour.
“…this is what so-called influencers of today should bear in mind. They are commercialising speech. The community at large should not be utilised to hurt the sentiments of certain sections. It’s not only freedom of speech, it’s commercial speech,” Justice Bagchi remarked.
The petitioner had shared videos as evidence, saying the behaviour of the comedians was irresponsible, insensitive and violated the rights of the persons with disabilities under Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India.
Dissemination of such online content, the petitioners argued, “propels offensive stereotypes and misguided portrayals against them, and detrimentally impacts their societal participation, and fosters insensitivity and inhumanity against them, and as such falls within the reasonable restrictions under Article 19(2).”
All five comedians, including Raina, were present in the court during the hearing.