As Munawar Faruqi controversy once again opens the debate on freedom of expression, we dig deeper

Sheetal

After Vir Das, who made news recently for his Two Indias monologue, it is now Munawar Faruqui, who is creating news by calling it quits as a certain section of society is not allowing him to perform. We dig deeper to trace where it all started…

Comedian Sunil Pal, the winner of Great India Laughter Challenge, opines, “Be it Munawar or Kunal Kamra or any other comedian who says that there’s no freedom of speech and people take offence without any reason, I have just one thing to say, why do they need to make punch-lines that involve abusive language or hurt someone’s religious sentiments? It was okay until they were making their shows and were putting it out on YouTube but then they had to promote it too. This made it available to the viewers who were not ready to watch their content in the first place.”

BJP spokesperson, Chandigarh, Gaurav Goel, shared the offensive video available on Twitter, where Munawar uses the song, Mera Piya Ghar Aya Ho Ram Ji as reference point and goes on to joke about Hindu deities and also uses a swear word. The said video on Hindu deities , however, never made it to his channel.

The alleged jokes on Hindu Gods had landed him in trouble eight months prior to his arrest this year in January and he had apologised and vowed never to hurt religious sentiments again. Since then, he has been performing political and anecdotal comedy. Goel adds, “I appreciate both the art and the artiste. But if in the name of art someone insults the Hindu deities and Hindutva or Hindu ethos, he will not be tolerated. Art should be used to unite citizens. In our country, irrespective of religion, artistes have been honoured and acknowledged with greatest of respect. We are fans of art, not of the efforts to break society through art.”

For the limelight

Ask Sunil if this hatred against Munawar could be religion-centric and he quips, “I will put Kamra and Munawar in the same box as I put Umar Sharif and Rafi sahab in one. The latter were talented artistes but the former are just opportunists posing as artistes. They know exactly what could get them the limelight. The YouTuber trend allows you to start off with abuses and hatred-filled content and when you have enough followers, you cannot wipe your past.” For him, Kapil Sharma, Sunil Grover, Johnny Lever and Jamie Lever are true comedians who can make a joke and whole family can laugh together.

Yet, Kapil reminds us of Kiku Sharda who went to jail for making fun of Dera Sachcha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh on stage. The artiste was booked under Section 295 A of the Indian Penal Code (outraging religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious belief).

Slow death of comedy

Kunal Kamra, who also does political comedy, has issued a statement in support of Munawar, “With every passing year, I feel laughter is costing comedians more and more. It’s costing them their spontaneity and its costing them their impulse. I have even heard some comedians telling jokes to their lawyers and showing their videos to a legal team before they release it online. The impulse of any artiste to be so calculative, a move in itself is a slow death of the art form. Laughter is beautiful, honest and most spurred by spontaneity- if comedians are calculating, what should they present to the audience to laugh at, for the audience will soon think what they should laugh on.”

The other side

Comedian Saurabh Pandey says, “It’s not Munawar’s show, but it’s the fundamental rights that are getting cancelled.” The stand-up comedian also wrote, “You don’t let comedians speak in India, then you complain when they speak at an international show.”

Swara Bhaskar also retweeted a post in Munawar’s context which read, “Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.”

There were many influencers and netizens who pointed at the irony of Munawar’s fate while Elvish Yadav, a YouTuber who openly trolled Swara Bhaskar and spread hatred, was felicitatedby Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and was seen beside Minister of Women and Child Development of India, Smriti Irani.

Celebs like Aditi Mittal, Mohd. Zeeshan Ayyub, boxer Vijender Singh and Varun Grover too had extended their support to Munawar who apparently has quit comedy for the time being.

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