At the Mercy of Interpretation

ON FEBRUARY 2 4 , Ranveer Allahbadia, the podcaster, was questioned by the Maharashtra Cyber Cell for his joke on India's Got Latent show, which went viral on so­cial media, leading to a severe backlash. Earlier, on February 18, the Supreme Court gave him protection from arrest, but came down heavily on him for his joke. "Just because you are popular, you cannot take society for granted. Is there anyone on earth who would like this language? There is something very dirty in his [Ranveer's] mind which has been vomited. Why should we protect him?" the court asked. It also restrained the popular podcaster from airing any further YouTube shows.

What is baffling in this case is the kind of attention Ranveer's remarks, which ironically he copied from somewhere else, has received from the police and other gov­ernment bodies. Three state police—Ma­harashtra, Assam, and Rajasthan—have filed cases against him. A leviathan po­litical and administrative machinery has sputtered to life, baying for his blood and that of the show's founder, the comedian Samay Raina. The Maharashtra Cyber Cell has reportedly scanned every episode of the show to look for similar remarks made by other guests. Raina has been served no­tices by Assam and Mumbai Police, asking him to appear in front of them. Raina is in the US and had asked for permission to appear through video conferencing—he will also be questioned after his return. On their part, both Raina and Ranveer have said that they are fully cooperating with law enforcement agencies. In a statement on social media, Raina added that his only intention was to entertain people.

The way police have come after the show and people associated with it is disproportionate. From the response, it looks as if they are chasing a crimi­nal rather than a comedian whose fault may have been that the borrowed joke he cracked is tasteless and cheap. Ranveer Allahbadia, who is popularly known as Beer Biceps, runs a popular podcast in which several top actors and politicians (including Union ministers) have appeared in the past. In fact, in March last year, Ranveer was felicitated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the first Na­tional Creators Award. While handing him the award, Modi even cracked a joke with him saying that since he (Ranveer) is asking the youth to do yoga and medi­tation, he might be accused of being a BJP supporter. Both Ranveer and Raina have not in any way ruffled the feathers of the BJP-led government or the larger Hindutva ecosystem like many others have done—the stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra, for example. In fact, Raina has in the past posted on X about how fear of cancellation from the left has prevented the Indian landscape from having comics like Andrew Schulz and Ricky Gervais.

Very few will disagree that a lot of con­tent generated on this particular YouTube show, and on online platforms in general, can at best be described as cringe-worthy. What passes for humour is simply bad comedy, sometimes aimed at the lowest common denominator. But this is also be­cause we are a country where the subtlety and nuance of humour can be lost on a majority. That is why in comedy shows one has to hire a Navjot Singh Sidhu to simply guffaw to serve as a cue for the audience to follow suit. The kind of joke that got Ranveer in trouble is crass and is aimed at attracting viewership simply by its shock value. It is difficult to defend this content on the basis of its quality. That is why in the Supreme Court, even Ranveer's lawyer Abhinav Chandrachud said that personally he felt disgusted (at the joke), "but whether it rises to the level of criminal offence is another question."

So far, it seems that even the remarks made by the Supreme Court do not come from a position of law but from a personal opinion. In democracy, it is a person's right to feel offended at a joke that hurts his sensibility. But should that then be taken up by police or court and turned into such a serious matter? That, too, at a time when there are far more pressing things like hate speech and other important matters to take cognisance of. In the courts alone, there are tens of thousands of cases that need serious attention.

The other thing that we have failed to understand is the changing demo­graphics of this country. We now have a big population that is aspirational in a way that we have never been before. In the current times, when the exposure to the world around us is just too much, there is a tendency among the young to be more open about issues than the previ­ous generations have been. We have been a little hypocritical about language and fail to admit that many things we find offensive are very much part of the lingua franca around us. The point in case: The actor-turned-politician Ravi Kishan, who has featured in steamy songs that speaks about things like lehanga and khatiya, has also jumped into becoming a part of the outrage industry. The younger generation speaks openly about things many would consider taboo. This is a generation that is comfortable with the idea of seeking a therapist for their "is­sues". Also, even if they don't like the tasteless jokes, they have to hide it some­times, lest they are seen as unmodern— many times in the young people's lingo, such people are referred to as boomers (referring to people born in the mid-twentieth century), and nobody in this generation likes to be called that. Also, as human psyche goes, nobody likes to be seen as someone who does not un­derstand humour. As the essayist Frank Moore Colby once wittily remarked: "Men will confess to treason, murder, arson, false teeth, or a wig. How many of them will own up to a lack of humour?"

To have a larger tolerance level towards humour, even cringe-worthy humour, is a sign of a modern civilised nation. In his book on the psychology of humour, Rod A Martin points to how after the Sep­tember 11 attack, many American com­mentators (wrongly) saw the al-Qaeda and the Muslims, in general, lacking a sense of humour—a trait which they associated with the thriving of democracy. Humour also has a way with bringing up uncom­fortable topics, like sex and aggression, as the scholar of folklore and humour, Elliott Oring, has suggested. Also, an interpretation of what constitutes a joke can differ so much that it doesn't make sense for even those who study it for a living to define it. As Oring says in one of his interviews: "We don't know. We can't precisely define what it is that makes something humorous. We don't understand why that if you accept the idea that it is humorous, we laugh at it. And we're sitting here for 2,500 years and we haven't the foggiest [clue]." In his essay 'Comic Racism and Violence', the scholar Michael Billig cites Freud's work to make the argument that we are not honest with ourselves about what makes us laugh. Now, of course, we are free to decide—but only for ourselves—what we consider hu­mour or what we consider pure cringe. And, accordingly, we may act by unsub­scribing from the comedian's channel or handle or berate him for his poor taste. But we cannot turn into a mob; and even if we do, the state or the court is not to follow suit. Because it is such a slippery slope—there is no guarantee that tomor­row what we may express as a joke or even an opinion might not be found offensive by another set of people. It happens some­times on social media, on platforms like X, generating a little heat and dust in the form of trolls, after which it dies down. But for the state agencies to get involved and turn such things into a spectacle of harass­ment is not desirable at all.

Many now fear that the government might use it as ruse to bring out a tight censorship on online content. In a vi­brant democracy, that is a no-no. The content generated online has been in the crosshairs of the government for long. There is a belief that the shock and awe against Ranveer and Raina is just a salvo whose target will turn out to be the real critics of the government. Forget Ger­vais, what will it say then of a country that has even made a silly podcaster like Ranveer Allahbadia disappear—someone who should have, in the first place, been taken as seriously as the internet sensation Orry. This is what should generate a debate, not the contents of a silly show. Instead of censorship, healthy democracies must allow humour—even political humour that comes at the cost of some big daddy or the other of politics. The spirit of humour, as the scholar of humour, John Morre­all, writes in Taking Laughter Seriously, is incompatible with fear (and hero worship). "Even the most powerful of rulers," he reminds us, "puts on his pants one leg at a time."