The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered content creator Samay Raina and other comedians to organise at least two events a month to raised funds for the corpus setup for the treatment of persons with disability.
The Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi passed the order in a case moved by the Cure SMA India Foundation for action against the online content that violates the right to life and dignity of persons with disability.
The Foundation accused Raina of making insensitive remarks in relation to the high-cost treatment for Spinal Muscular Atrophy and ridiculing a person with disability. Other comedians also are facing similar allegations in the case.
The Court noted that in pursuance with the earlier orders, the respondents Raina, Vipul Goyal, Balraj Paramjeet Singh Ghai, Sonali Thakar aka Sonali Aditya Desai and Nishant Jagdish Tanwar, volunteered to hold events to generate funds for the cause. They also sought permission to share the success stories of the differently-abled.
The Court said it was up to Raina and other respondents to persuade the specially-abled persons to join them in their programs.
"We leave it to respondents 6 to 10 to persuade and invite the specially abled persons on their platforms to promote the cause of generating funds to provide timely treatment to specially abled including those suffering from SMA. We are confident that if respondent 6 to 10 show sincerity about showing their achievements.. they will also come on the platform for wider publicity of their cause. We hope and expect that such few memorable events will take place before we hear matter the next date. Let such two programs be held twice a month," the Court ordered.
In August, the Court had ordered Raina and others to publish apologies on YouTube and other platforms for making insensitive remarks against persons with disability. They had also been summoned to the Court.
During the consideration of the matter, Senior Advocate Aparajita Singh, appearing for the Foundation, had suggested that the content creators can highlight the cause of the persons with disability. Today, Singh submitted a note in this regard. The Court then passed the order asking Raina and others to hold the programs.