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Journalism of Courage
Samay Raina’s popular show India’s Got Latent is controversy’s favourite child. The tenth episode of the show—which saw Raina, comedian Tanmay Bhat, producer and actor Raghu Ram, neurologist Dr Sid Warrier, and Balraj Singh, the owner of Habitat (the show’s venue)—was released on YouTube recently and has been making waves.
Bunty Banerjee, the aspiring standup comedian, delivered a performance that referred to Deepika Padukone becoming a mother and battling with depression. Banerjee, a Bihari-Bengali woman, began by joking about both states. She went on to share her experience as a mother of a two-year-old and how she has been sleep-deprived. Further, she joked on Padukone, who recently embraced motherhood.
In the viral clip, Banerjee says, “Deepika Padukone also became a mother recently, right? Great. Now she knows what depression really looks like.” The judges and the audience burst into laughter.
She then clarified her stance, saying she wasn’t mocking the actor’s depression due to her breakup. “Actual depression happens when your sleep breaks, and your kid wakes in the middle of the night at 3 am and the kid wants to eat poop or play at any order.”
Watch the clip here:
The clip stirred up attention on social media, garnering nearly two million views on X. Reacting to the backlash, Raina wrote, “Guys it’s not fair. You cannot outrage on twitter. Please outrage on my youtube comments section so there is some ad revenue at least.”
Several users lined up to slam the show and the comedians over clapping and laughing at jokes on the actor. A user wrote, “I think these women make it difficult for all women by underplaying everything we go through for male validation-our reproductive health, childbirth, break ups (here she has assumed that the reason),mental health in general, post-partum depression, pressures of being a new mom.”
Another user commented, “Every one in this frame should be ashamed of themselves. There are no such categories to depression. Stupidity on the rise with stupid shows like these where people do actually participate. Shameful how everyone found it funny. Dumb!!”
“The entire panel should be ashamed. And to see that one of the panelist is a famous neurologist Dr. Sid warrier. Shameful,” a third user reacted. “Not cool,” another user commented.
Deepika Padukone has been advocating for mental health for a while now. She also founded The Live Love Laugh Foundation to help people suffering from depression, anxiety, and stress.
