Comedian Samay Raina, Four Others Appear Before SC Over Alleged Insensitive Remarks On Disabilities; Court Warns Against Absence On Next Hearing

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered stand-up comedians Samay Raina, Vipul Goyal, Balraj Paramjit Singh Ghai and Nishant Jagdish Tanwar to appear in person on the next hearing in the case of alleged insensitive remarks about persons with disabilities.

A division bench of Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi allowed comedian Sonali Thakkar alias Sonali Aditya Desai to appear virtually. The top court noted the presence of Raina, Goyal, Tanwar, Ghai and Thakkar and asked them to file their written reply to the petition within two weeks.

The Apex court clearly said that no additional time will be given after the stipulated time limit and absence in the next hearing will be viewed seriously.

Also, the Supreme Court asked Attorney General R. Venkataramani, representing the Central Government, to prepare guidelines while balancing freedom of expression on social media and the rights and obligations of other individuals. Venkataramani sought time from the court to provide guidance on the issue and said detailed deliberations would be required to effectively implement the guidelines.

“What we are doing is for posterity. You have to ensure that not a single word is misused by anyone. You have to ensure balance. We have to protect citizens’ rights. A framework must be there that the dignity of anyone is not violated,” the bench said.

The top court was hearing a petition filed by M/s Cure SMA Foundation seeking a prohibition on the broadcast of derogatory and denigrating content on the digital media against persons with disability. It also sought the formulation of guidelines to safeguard the rights and dignity of persons with disability in the context of the broadcasting of online content.

On May 5, the bench had summoned the comedians to appear before it or face coercive action after the plea alleged that they ridiculed persons suffering from SMA, a rare disorder, and also those suffering from other disabilities on their show.

The top court had also issued notice to the Union of India through the Ministries of Information and Broadcasting, Electronics and Information Technology, Social Justice and Empowerment, and News Broadcasters and Digital Association, and Indian Broadcasting and Digital Foundation.

The NGO brought to the notice of the court the broadcast of certain online content, media and programmes that are derogatory, offensive, denigrating, ableist or belittling to persons with disability, or their diseases, or their treatment options.

The petitioner was also aggrieved by the lack of any explicit statutory guidelines to sufficiently regulate the broadcast of such online content, which violates the right to life and dignity of persons with disabilities, while transgressing the qualified right of free speech and expression. It asked the court to put a positive obligation on both the government and private actors to adopt a unique standard of representation of persons with disability in the online domain.

The NGO accused Raina of insensitive remarks on persons with such conditions, high-costing drugs and treatment options for Spinal Muscular Atrophy and also alleged to have ridiculed a person with disability. It flagged videos where he made comments on persons with disabilities. The petition said these comedians are public figures and enjoy a following of millions of viewers/users on various social media intermediaries.

“The petitioner is concerned by certain live and pre-recorded event videos of these individuals, due to their offensive, denigrating and dehumanising representation of persons with disabilities,” the petition said. “These videos shed light on the widespread irresponsible, insensitive and violate dissemination of such online content that contravenes the rights of the persons with disability under Article 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India, 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),” said the petition.