Bombay High Court Nagpur Bench Upholds Sikh Helmet Exemption Under Section 129, Rejects Article 14 Challenge

A Nagpur student's plea calling the Sikh turban exemption from helmet rules unconstitutional class legislation was dismissed by the Nagpur Bench.

The Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court has dismissed a writ petition challenging the proviso to Section 129 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, which exempts turban-wearing Sikhs from the mandatory helmet requirement for motorcycle riders. A Division Bench of Justice Urmila Joshi-Phalke and Justice Nivedita P. Mehta held that the exemption survives scrutiny under Article 14 of the Constitution because it rests on a reasonable classification rather than arbitrary class legislation. The petitioner, Kirtesh Chaudhari, a 23-year-old student from NEERI Colony in Nagpur, argued the case in person, contending that carving out an exception for one religious community while penalising others under Section 194(d) amounted to unequal treatment. The Union of India defended the provision through the Deputy Solicitor General. The bench's reasoning traces through Supreme Court and Delhi High Court precedent on when religion-based classification survives constitutional scrutiny.

The Dispute Before the High Court

Chaudhari filed Criminal Writ Petition No. 416 of 2026 under Article 226, seeking a declaration that the first proviso to Section 129 of the MV Act was unconstitutional. Section 129 mandates that every person above four years of age driving, riding, or being carried on a motorcycle wear protective headgear meeting Bureau of Indian Standards specifications while in a public place. The proviso excludes a Sikh who is wearing a turban while riding.

The petitioner's case, as recorded by the bench, was straightforward: the provision creates two classes of motorcycle riders, one bound to wear a helmet and one exempted purely on the basis of religious identity, and this amounts to class legislation denying equal protection of laws to everyone outside that identity. He sought a declaration that both Section 129 and the penal provision under Section 194(d) of the MV Act were inconsistent with Article 14 and therefore unconstitutional.

The Union of India, represented by the Deputy Solicitor General assisted by counsel, resisted the petition on affidavit, taking the position that the exemption is not violative of Article 14 because it constitutes a reasonable classification, not an arbitrary one.

Reasonable Classification Versus Class Legislation Under Article 14

The bench framed the constitutional question in familiar terms: Article 14 guarantees equality before the law and prohibits unreasonable discrimination, but it “permits ‘reasonable classification’” where government can treat groups differently if there is a valid and logical basis tied to a public purpose. The judgment records the two-fold test applied — the classification must rest on intelligible differentia distinguishing the excepted group from others, and that differentia must bear a rational relation to the object the statute seeks to achieve.

Applying this test, the bench observed that the exemption for Sikhs is not carved out of the substantive part of Section 129 but sits in the first proviso, and is expressly conditioned on the rider actually wearing a turban while riding. The court read this textual structure as indicating that the proviso targets a specific, identifiable practice — turban-wearing — rather than granting a blanket religious carve-out. As the judgment puts it, exemption given to Sikhs is “not on the basis of caste or creed or religion” as such, but tied to the practical fact that members of the community customarily wear a turban that itself serves a protective function analogous to the object of the helmet requirement.

The bench also placed the challenged provision in its statutory setting, noting that Section 129 falls under Chapter VIII of the MV Act dealing with “Control of Traffic,” and that Section 138 separately empowers State Governments to give effect to such provisions. This context, the bench reasoned, reinforced that the helmet mandate exists for road-safety regulation, and the turban exemption does not dilute that regulatory object for the vast majority of riders.

Precedent Relied On By the Bench

The judgment leans heavily on prior rulings to hold the question as no longer open. It cites the Supreme Court's decision in Ajay Canu vs. Union of India and ors, reported in 1988 AIR 2027, which held that the helmet rule itself is not violative of fundamental rights and that any restriction it imposes is reasonable and in the interest of the general public.

It also draws on the Delhi High Court's ruling in Pt. Parmanand Katara vs. Union of India and anr, which had directed the Commissioner of Police to ensure compliance with Sections 128 and 129 of the MV Act, and more directly on Jamshed Ansari vs. The State, Government of NCT of Delhi and anr (Writ Petition No. 2825/2014), where the Delhi High Court had already held that Section 129 does not violate Article 14. The bench extracts paragraph 28 of that judgment, which in turn relies on Moti Das vs. S.P. Sahi, AIR 1959 SC 942, for the proposition that classification “may be based on religion” where the legislature determines that a particular community's practices warrant different treatment, without this amounting to discrimination against others.

Drawing on this chain of authority, along with the Andhra Pradesh High Court's Full Bench observations in Gogireddy Sambireddy vs. Gogireddy Jayamma, AIR 1972 AP 156, on Parliament's competence to recognise different personal-law systems without offending secular character, the Nagpur Bench concluded that legislatures and governments are not barred from identifying which community's existing practice makes it unnecessary to compel that community toward a particular reform — here, mandatory helmet use — while still requiring it of others.

The DSGI's submissions before the bench also referred to the Goa Bench decision in Girish Uskaikar vs. Chief Secretary and anr, reported in 2001 4 Bom CR 122, which had earlier examined the same exemption and found it consistent with Article 14 on the footing that it is not based on caste, creed, or religion as such, but on the practical fact that Sikh riders wear a turban serving the underlying protective purpose of the statute.

Findings on the Rising Toll of Two-Wheeler Head Injuries

The bench noted the increasing incidence of two-wheeler accidents and deaths caused by head injuries as the backdrop against which Section 129 mandates protective headgear for riders and pillion riders. It observed that similar helmet rules exist in Delhi and Andhra Pradesh, situating the Sikh exemption as a narrow, practice-linked exception within a broader nationwide safety framework rather than a standalone religious privilege.

On this basis, the court rejected the petitioner's contention that the exemption amounts to impermissible class legislation. It held that Article 14 “forbids class legislation and not reasonable classification for the purposes of legislation,” and that the intelligible differentia here — the customary wearing of a turban by Sikh riders, itself performing a function analogous to a helmet — bears a rational connection to the statute's road-safety object.

Order

The Division Bench held that the controversy was “no more res integra,” being concluded by the Supreme Court's ruling in Ajay Canu and the Delhi High Court's ruling in Jamshed Ansari, and found that Section 129 of the MV Act cannot be said to violate any fundamental right guaranteed under the Constitution. The petition was accordingly held to be without merit and dismissed, with the Rule discharged.