Sital Punja AI image incident — Sep 2026
Labour councillor Sital Punja calls for stronger AI regulations after the Hillingdon Conservative Party posted AI-generated caricatures of her online
- Reported date
- Sep 23, 2026
- Target
- Sital Punja
The exact incident date was not established. This entry is dated by its source report.
A west London councillor has called for enhanced protections for elected officials following the publication of AI-generated caricatures depicting her on social media. Sital Punja, a Labour member of Hillingdon Council, alleged that the images, which manipulated her likeness, utilized racist and antisemitic tropes to target her.
What happened
The Hillingdon Conservative Group posted AI-generated cartoons on X that featured Councillor Punja. One image depicted her as a figure controlling white male counterparts like puppets, a motif Punja identified as a long-standing antisemitic and racist trope. Another image showed her running past horse-drawn carts while criticizing Labour policies. Punja, who is of Indian descent, stated that the images used exaggerated features to portray her as a menace and argued that the content went beyond political satire.
The Hillingdon Conservative Group rejected the allegations, maintaining that the images were strictly political satire intended to reference Punja’s former influence as deputy leader of the Labour group. They denied any racist or antisemitic intent and noted that local Labour branches had also posted AI-manipulated images of Conservative members. Punja clarified that those accounts were not associated with her.
Academic experts noted that the "puppet master" motif has deep historical roots in antisemitic propaganda and warned that AI tools risk intensifying the use of such imagery by drawing on datasets containing historical prejudice. Punja has reported the images to the Hillingdon Council’s Standards Committee and is advocating for updates to the members' code of conduct to specifically address social media and AI-generated content.