Kunal Kamra: "I'm okay without solidarity"

How to make jokes in the face of state repression

- SHAHID TANTRAY

On 23 March, the standup comedian Kunal Kamra posted Naya Bharat, a set about contemporary politics he had recorded at Mumbai's The Habitat in January, on his YouTube channel. Within hours, cadre from the Shiv Sena, which is part of the ruling coalition in Maharashtra, vandalised the venue, taking umbrage at a song parody from the set in which he had indirectly called the deputy chief minister Eknath Shinde a traitor—a reference to his role in splitting the Sena, in 2022. Four members of the Shiv Sena filed separate police complaints in different parts of the state. Facing charges of defamation and public nuisance, Kamra refused to apologise and eventually secured anticipatory bail from the Madras and Bombay high courts. He spoke to Shahid Tantray, a multimedia reporter at The Caravan, about how he negotiates the various controversies he has faced during the tenure of the Narendra Modi government.

Let us begin with the show that triggered all this. Did you anticipate the backlash you have received?

I put it out for my audience, and they received it well. I was not anticipating much, because there’s no point anticipating these days. It was put out on the day the biggest celebration of the country happens, which is an IPL match between Mumbai and Chennai. I had strictly put it out for my audiences because I was done with the material. I was doing the material for around a year, and all the jokes, for me, had become stale, and I wanted to write another hour. The only way you can push yourself to write a new hour is by putting the old jokes [online], because you cannot use the same joke on the same person twice—they wouldn’t laugh.