Kunal Kamra on calling Mahabharat ‘mythology’: ‘Sacred texts are cultural tenets, not history’

He then wrote that mythological texts, which are considered sacred, are “cultural tenets and not part of history.” He shared, “What elevates sacred texts is that they are cultural tenets & not part of history. Mythology gives meaning to the abstract like love, duty, desire, destiny & much more. Mythology holds ground in every time period & beyond it. History documents periods. Now you can go back to abusing me.”

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| History tells us what we can establish happened |
| Mythology tells us
What the best in people believed,
What they feared,
What they hoped,
What the world meant to them
& their Imagination of a fulfilled life.
What elevates sacred texts is that they are cultural tenets & not…

— Kunal Kamra (@kunalkamra88) August 25, 2026

What Kunal Kamra said during the show

During the episode, which also had Shubham Gaur, Jaspreet Singh and Sunil Sharma aka Rofl Gandhi, one of the guests was supposed to present a statement, and the panel was expected to guess if it was a truth or a lie. Rofl Gandhi presented his statement wherein he said that he once missed an examination because he was helping someone who met with a road accident. As part of his statement, he said that the accident happened near Kurukshetra.

Since Rofl Gandhi was lying about the statement, he had to manufacture many statements about the scene he had set up. He was then asked about the geographical location of Kurukshetra. “When people of UP wanted to fight, they went to Kurukshetra during Mahabharat,” said Rofl Gandhi. To this, Gaurav responded, “Oh. War of Kurukshetra, or was it the battle of…? Wasn’t it the Battle of Panipat?”

After hearing this, Kamra jumped in and said, “Don’t mix history and mythology. They are different.” Shubham Gaur then said, “What mythology, man! That’s my history.”

Kamra then started to ask more questions to Shubham. He asked, “Tell me the year when it happened,” and to this, Shubham, “Bhai (Brother), let’s not disturb someone else’s show.” Gaurav added more jokes to the mix and said, “1000 BC.”

What led to the controversy?

Soon after the episode was uploaded on August 23, the clip that shows Kunal Kamra saying that Mahabharat is mythology and history started getting circulated widely, with many criticising his comments. Some even  praised Shubham Gaur, saying that his comments were more in line with what they believed.

About Mahabharat

Authored by Vyasa, Mahabharat is said to be written around the 3rd-4th century BC. The text has since been through many iterations and its many versions have been told over many generations.

In the last few decades, the text has been adapted into films and TV shows, the most notable one being BR Chopra’s Doordarshan show Mahabharat, which aired on television in 1988.