MUMBAI: Deputy chief minister Eknath Shinde Tuesday responded to the controversy stirred by Kunal Kamra‘s video alluding to him as “gaddar” and likened the stand-up comedian’s jibe to “taking a supari”, saying if decorum is not maintained while doing satire “action causes a reaction”.
Kamra, meanwhile, asked Khar police for a week’s time to appear before them after he was issued a notice Monday night in connection with the FIR lodged against him over the controversial video of a seven-week-old show he shared online Sunday.
His lawyer submitted a letter explaining his absence due to professional commitments in Pondicherry. On Tuesday, a second FIR for defamation was filed against Kamra in Dombivli based on a complaint filed by a Shiv Sena functionary the previous day.
The comic also put out a fresh video on X of a parody song with images of Shiv Sainiks burning his effigy and vandalising the studio Habitat in which he shot his controversial show in the background. In his Feb 2 show, he had sung “Hum honge kangaal… (We’ll be reduced to poverty)” set to the tune of the popular song ‘Hum honge kamyab’. In Tuesday’s video, he used the same song. One of the lines in the song was “Mann mein Nathuram, harkate Asaram (Nathuram on the mind, and acts like Asaram)”.
DCP (zone IX) Dikshit Gedam said the police will decide about whether to remove the show from the online platform. Kamra had in the controversial video performed a parody of a popular Hindi film song in which he alluded to Shinde. He also made jokes about recent political developments in Maharashtra, including the splits in the Shiv Sena and NCP.
On potential threats, Kamra told TOI that he has been avoiding phne calls and messages from unknown people, noting that “the threat is openly made by politicians through the media. What can I say when they are making an open threat?”
