The Supreme Court of India on Tuesday strongly criticized podcaster Ranveer Gautam Allahbadia for his remarks on the online show India’s Got Latent, calling them “dirty” and “depraved.” While granting him protection from arrest in multiple FIRs, the Court expressed serious disapproval of his words and conduct.
A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and N Kotiswar Singh condemned Allahbadia’s statements, stating, “There has to be a height of lack of responsibility. This kind of condemnable behavior … that somebody thinks himself that ‘I can, because now I have become so and so popular and therefore I can speak any kind of words and that I can take the entire society to be granted’.”
The Court further remarked, “You tell us anyone on the earth would like these kinds of words to be told. You are insulting people, parents also. We don’t want to say, there is something very dirty in his mind that has been vomited by way of this program.”
Allahbadia had approached the Supreme Court seeking protection from multiple FIRs lodged against him in Mumbai, Guwahati, and Jaipur. His counsel, Dr. Abhinav Chandrachud, acknowledged the offensive nature of his client’s remarks but questioned whether they amounted to a criminal offense. “As an officer of the court, I personally am disgusted by what the petitioner has said but whether it rises to the level of a criminal offence is another question,” he submitted.
When asked to define obscenity, Chandrachud referred to the Supreme Court’s ruling in Apoorva Arora’s case, arguing that mere profanity does not constitute obscenity unless it excites “lustful thoughts or sexual thoughts in the mind of a reasonable person.” However, the Bench disagreed, stating, “It’s not the question of arousing lustful thoughts. The question is, what are the parameters of vulgarity in a society where certain self-evolved values exist?”
Justice Kant further noted that Allahbadia had seemingly copied his content from an Australian show but failed to follow international norms of responsible broadcasting. “We are not sitting in ivory towers. We know he has copied from [an] Australian program… There are certain societies where they warn you. There are adult channels, they warn you that children are not to watch this kind of program, the patients, the elder people may also not watch this program,” he observed.
