Display apology on podcasts or shows, SC tells influencers

Commercial and prohibited speeches are not covered under the fundamental right, the Supreme Court said on Monday as it asked five social media influencers, including “India’s Got Latent” host Samay Raina, to display their unconditional apology in their podcasts or shows for ridiculing persons with disabilities and rare genetic disorders.

A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi said the degree of repentance should be higher than the degree of offending and made it clear that the court would consider imposing a penalty on the influencers for offending differently abled persons at a later stage.

“It is like purging contempt,” Justice Kant said while asking the influencers to apprise the court of how much penalty they were willing to pay, which in turn could be utilised in the treatment of people suffering from rare genetic disorders like spinal muscular atrophy (SMA).

The five influencers are accused of making fun of the differently abled and those suffering from the SMA and visual impairment.

Except Sonali Thakkar, alias Sonali Aditya Desai, four influencers, including Raina, were present in the courtroom.

Justice Bagchi said the influencers should be more cautious while creating humour related to different communities, especially when it pertained to “apartheid in society”.

The Bench allowed the intervention of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and asked Attorney General R Venkataramani to come up with guidelines to regulate the content on social media while taking into account the views of all stakeholders.

Venkataramani said the government was in the process of formulating the guidelines, but ruled out any “gag order”.