An Ontario judge has ruled again Sikh rider Baljinder Badesha, who challenged the Canadian province's mandatory helmet law based on religious grounds.
Earlier we reported on the story of Baljinder Badesha. An immigrant to Ontario, Canada from his native India, where he was a regular motorcycle rider, Badesha was cited for not wearing a helmet in accordance with the province's mandatory helmet law. As a devout Sikh, Badesha objects to wearing a helmet based on religious belief that only a turban cover his hair. The 39-year-old challenged the law taking his case to the Ontario courts, with the support of the Ontario Human Rights Commission.
Now the verdict is in. An Ontario judge, James Blacklock, has ruled in favor of the government and against Badesha, citing safety issues and the medical costs of involved in traumatic brain injury.
Supporters of Badesha argue that the law and subsequent court ruling amount to religious discrimination. Sikhs have received exemptions for mandatory helmet usage based on religious grounds in the past, including current motorcycle helmet laws in other Canadian provinces like British Columbia.
The current Ontario court ruling is reminiscent of a California Appeals court ruling in 1993, in which a Sikh also challenge helmet laws based on religious grounds. The court's decision in the case,
Buhl v. Hannigan, found that California's mandatory helmet law was "not rendered unconstitutional just because it incidentally impacts a person's religious practices."
The United States has, however, made legal exceptions to Sikhs and other individuals based on religious grounds.
In the late '70s OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) exempted Amish and Sikh workers who refused to wear hard hats based on religious grounds. In the '90s the decision was revised, broadening the general exemption to all individuals who "for reasons of personal religious convictions, object to wearing hard hats in the workplace." But OSHA also included a clause that was, in essence, an exemption of the exemption stating "There may be, however, circumstances in the future that would involve a hard hat hazard sufficiently grave to raise a compelling governmental interest for requiring the wearing of hard hats, notwithstanding employee personal religious convictions."
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