Summary of the Case:

Pandori, a Khalsa Sikh and teacher under the Peel Board of Education was prohibited to wear his religiously significant Kirpan due to a new no-weapons policy in his school district. The Peel Board made this policy in a response to the supposed increasing number of knife incidents and violence in its schools. Pandori took this case to the Ontario Human Rights Commission which set up an inquiry under the Human Rights Code to investigate it. They found that there were little-to-no incidents of a Kirpan being used as a weapon let alone in any Peel school and that other Toronto-area schools were allowing students and faculty to wear them freely. With this, the Board of Inquiry ruled that this policy amounted to religious discrimination. But the Peel School Board argued that the kirpan could be seen as a dangerous weapon by other non-Sikhs and were already prohibited in some courtrooms and airplanes for that exact reason. The Peel School Board then claimed that it is reasonable to impose Kirpans to ensure the safety of the school and that they would not accommodate to the requirements of the Khalsa Sikhs. The Board of Inquiry eventually ruled that the school boards policy discriminated against Khalsa Sikhs and allowed Pandori to continue to wear his Kirpan, …show more content…
That Kirpans are prohibited on Canadian airplanes and that some judges in Manitoba have the power to exclude kirpans from their courtrooms. The Board also contended that schools were special places and that the Ontario Human Rights Code had to be interpreted lightly because of that. They saw that it was reasonable to impose its weapons ban on Kirpans to ensure the safety of the students and faculty under its jurisdiction and that they would not accommodate the requirements of Khalsa Sikhs without undue