The Supreme Court on Thursday addressed issues raised in the India’s Got Talent case – which has attracted the attention of several YouTubers, including Ranveer Allahbadia and Samaya Raina – and addressed concerns over content labeled as “anti-national”.
Justice Joymalya Bagchi, who was also on the bench, asked whether creators would accept responsibility when their content is seen in this light, as reported by NDTV.
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“Where content is perceived as anti-national. Will the content creator take responsibility for it?” Justice Joymalya Bagchi, who is also a member of the bench, said this. “The difficulty we face is the response time, once the ridiculous material is uploaded, by the time the authorities react it has gone viral to millions of viewers, so how can you control that?”
During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, argued that the case was not only about obscenity but also perversion, highlighting a loophole in the regulation of user-generated content, NDTV reported.
“Freedom of speech is a precious right, but it cannot extend to perversion,” he said.
The Supreme Court further said that someone must be held responsible for the content uploaded on social media, according to the report.
“That’s the problem, so I’m making my own channel, I’m not answerable to anyone… someone has to be answerable,” said Chief Justice Surya Kant.
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Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the disabled professor who wants to join the proceedings, warned that labeling the content as anti-national could do more harm than good.
Justice Bagchi replied, “Forget the anti-nationalist bits, if there is a video that shows that this part is not part of India, what will you do about it?”
According to an NDTV report, the court questioned the Center as to why such cases continue to occur when a monitoring system is already in place. It then gave the government four weeks to come up with regulations to deal with user-generated content on social media.
Judge Bagchi said: “There should be a warning for someone who might be shocked by such content. Not just over 18s… To say the content is not suitable for general consumption.”
The court said the autonomous regulatory body could have a combination of different experts, including someone from the judiciary and the media. “Let something come on a pilot basis and if it stifles freedom of speech and expression then it can be looked at. We need to build a responsible society and once that happens most problems will be solved,” it said.
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Earlier this year, the Supreme Court came down heavily on Samay Raina for allegedly making insensitive remarks about people with disabilities.
The court ordered Raina and four other comedians – Vipul Goyal, Balraj Paramjeet Singh Ghai, Nishant Jagdish Tanwar and Sonali Thakkar (aka Sonali Aditya Desai) – to unconditionally apologize on their YouTube channels and other platforms.
On May 5, the bench asked the comedians to appear before it or face enforcement action after allegations that they mocked people suffering from SMA, a rare disorder, as well as people suffering from other disabilities, in their show.
In early October, stand-up comedian Samay Raina apologized for making insensitive remarks towards people with disabilities on his YouTube show ‘India’s Got Latent’.
On his Instagram, comedian Samay Raina apologized for the pain caused by his show to people with disabilities. He also shared an apology on behalf of other comedians who include Vipul Goyal, Sonali Thakkar, Nishant Tanwar and Balraj Ghai.
(With inputs from ANI, NDTV)
