Shiv Sena on Monday issued a strong condemnation of comedian Kunal Kamra over his “distasteful and defamatory” remarks during a recent performance at Mumbai’s Habitat Comedy Club.
The party accused Kamra of deliberately targeting Maharashtra’s Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and distorting the state’s political landscape to serve his own agenda, calling it a calculated attack on the leadership.
He has once again abused the right to free speech, abusing humor as a guise to vituperate individuals and disseminate politically motivated falsehoods," Shiv Sena declared.
In its official statement, the party explained that it will not allow anybody to insult and defame those leaders who have committed themselves to serving the people of Maharashtra.
We want Kunal Kamra to make an unconditional apology for his statement against Eknath Shinde and stop using comedy as a tool to promote hatred and disinformation," the statement further added.
Shiv Sena also accused Kamra of having a history of offensive and provocative conduct, so it was clear that this was not a one-time occurrence. The party brought to light his consistent disrespect towards institutions, individuals, and religious sentiments in the name of satire.
The statement also drew on some of Kamra's previous incidents, such as the 2020 contempt of court case when he was prosecuted by the Supreme Court for tweeting scornfully at former Chief Justice DY Chandrachud. His comments calling the Supreme Court a "Brahmin-Baniya" institution at a comedy show also attracted widespread condemnation.
Also, the party remembered the 2020 airport scandal in which Kamra was banned by several airlines after he had a confrontation with a senior journalist on a flight and posted about the incident online with abusive remarks. News from the same year also accused Kamra of opening fake social media accounts to harass women comedians.
Shiv Sena also referred to Kamra's 2021 complaint against the Modi government when he had claimed that it had "blood on its hands" amid the COVID-19 pandemic, which the party described as an exercise in spreading false information and hatred.
The party also referred to an incident in which Kamra posted a manipulated video of a child singing for Prime Minister Narendra Modi, prompting action from the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR). In the same vein, in 2022, he was charged with disrespecting India's National Emblem via a morphed image ridiculing the Kashmiri Pandit genocide and the movie The Kashmir Files. In the same year, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) sued him for allegedly ridiculing Hindu gods, which resulted in the cancellation of a number of his performances.
In 2023, Kamra legally opposed the government's IT Rules meant to check disinformation, carrying on what Shiv Sena referred to as his crusade to derail regulatory processes. The party further accused him of repeatedly taunting the Election Commission and spouting unfounded conspiracy theories against the integrity of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in 2023-24.
Shiv Sena underlined that although free speech is a fundamental right, it does not confer the freedom to insult, abuse, or defame others.
The party insisted that Kamra's remarks were a calculated effort to mislead public opinion and besmirch Eknath Shinde's reputation.
"His close connection with Aditya Thackeray and the UBT Sena is well known, creating serious doubts about his latest publicity stunt being politically motivated," the party alleged.
The timing of Kamra's statement, Shiv Sena pointed out, was also important since it came in the wake of a petition moved by the father of the deceased Disha Salian.
"It is clear that he has been strategically deployed by his political masters to deflect attention from the investigation and mislead the public," the party alleged.
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