NEW DELHI: Could there be a bar on Santa-Banta jokes, the staple of many social networking sites? The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to examine whether such jokes should be banned for allegedly being racist, ridiculing Sikhs and projecting them as foolish and naive.

A bench of Justices T S Thakur and V Gopala Gawda agreed to hear a PIL filed by an advocate seeking the court’s direction to ban websites which circulate ‘Sardar’ jokes. She alleged that there were more than 5,000 such sites, projecting Sikhs as people of low intellect and not well versed in English.

Petitioner Harvinder Chowdhury said cracking jokes on a particular community amounts to racial abuse and hurting religious sentiments. She alleged that Sikhs faced ridicule in foreign countries as well because of these jokes. She also filed 50 jokes downloaded from various websites along with her petition to show that these were derogatory and sought a ban on their circulation.

“There are more than 5,000 websites which spread jokes on Sardars projecting Sikhs as unintelligent, stupid, idiot, foolish, naive and not well versed in English… It amounts to violation of the fundamental right to life and to live with dignity, as guaranteed under the Constitution,” she told the bench.

The bench after a brief hearing asked the petitioner to file additional documents and previous judgments of the court to substantiate her plea that the court can interfere in this matter and such jokes can be banned.

Referring to noted writer Khushwant Singh’s books on jokes, the court also said that some of the jokes are made by Sardars themselves and members of the community might not like the idea of banning such jokes. “The community is known for great sense of humour and they also enjoy such jokes,” the bench said.

The petitioner, however, asked why only a particular community was targeted and insisted that the court intervene in the issue as the Centre had not taken any action despite her representation. She also said that the Centre should be directed to install web-filters to prevent such websites from circulating jokes on Sikhs.

She said these websites were also hurting religious sentiments. “12 o’clock has a great significance in Sikh history but through these websites… (it) is referred to as a time when the brain and senses of a Sikh stop working,” she said and added.

The bench ordered that her plea be listed after two months and asked the petitioner to come fully prepared to argue the case on merit.