Santa Banta jokes under Supreme Court scanner; petitioner says it makes Sikhs look 'stupid'

The Supreme Court will look into a plea for a ban on websites carrying jokes on Sikhs after a lawyer-petitioner Harvinder Chowdhary told the apex court on Friday the community was projected as a people of low intellect, “stupid and foolish”. Responding to the petition, an apex court bench of Justice T.S. Thakur and Justice V. Gopala Gowda asked Chowdhary why she wanted such a ban as “this (Sikh) community is known for a great sense of humour and they also enjoy such jokes”. [caption id=“attachment_2471634” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Supreme Court of India/ Reuters[/caption] “This is only amusement. Why (do) you want it to be stopped,” Justice Thakur said. “All jokes relating to the Sikh community should be stopped. My children are humiliated and feel embarrassed and they don’t want to suffix Singh with their name,” Chowdhary argued. Chowdhary said whenever she used public transport, including Delhi metro, she came across instances where even on trivial issues people were ridiculed while citing jokes relating of the Sikh community. Referring to a recent comment by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during electioneering in Bihar that Bihar residents were the most intelligent people, the petitioner said it reflected as if other communities were not intelligent. Justice Thakur responded that the prime minister would say the same thing about Sikhs if he went to Chandigarh and Chowdhary shot back saying that would not happen because the BJP and the Shiromani Akali Dal don’t get on right now. Urging the court to direct the government to clamp down on the more than 5,000 websites like www.jokes duniya.com/category/sardar-jokes.htm, the petitioner said, “They are criticising one community and it should stop.” Naming a number of websites carrying Sikh-centric jokes, Chowdhary sought directions to the Telecom Ministry to install filters to weed out jokes relating to the community. She said these websites created public nuisance under Section 268 of Indian Penal Code and it was a crime under the cyber laws. The matter has been posted for hearing on November 16 as Chowdhary wants to file more documents in support. IANS