What happens next in stand-up comedian Munawar Faruqui’s journey remains to be seen by all and sundry, but the disruptions in the life of a young Indian Muslim comedian, on causes deemed to be divine by mortals who stand to gain a lot, politically and ideologically, are significant events for India, especially in the light of the shift of India’s cultural tectonic plates.
Ansab Aamir | TwoCircles.net
NEW DELHI – “Let us go, for the length of our journey demands it,” wrote Dante, the celebrated 14th-century Italian poet. These words are significant not just because of their relevance in the journey of an ascending Muslim professional in India, but even more pivotal, because these words are quoted from his work The Divine Comedy, and are being used in the description of a stand-up comic, Munawar Faruqui. Faruqui has been forced to “let” his stand-up career “go”, after 12 of his shows were cancelled in November, with his latest event in Gurgaon also being cancelled due to pressure from the right-wing political parties over “Hindu sentiments” being allegedly offended by his jokes and the subsequent threat to law and order.
In many ways, the usage of the title The Divine Comedy for Faruqui’s profile is significant, and may even be considered ironic. The “comedy’ in Dante’s title, after all, has nothing to do with humour but is chosen to portray the literature nomenclature of the early 1300s when any story deemed to have a happy ending was labelled as such. That logical fallacy would have been a critical factor if we were not living in a country where Faruqui was jailed for a joke he never cracked.
While it remains to be seen whether his ending would be happy or sad, the beginning is surely moving.
Born on January 28, 1992, to a Muslim family in Junagadh, Gujarat, Faruqui’s work drew heavily from the political circumstances around him while growing up. His home was destroyed during the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat. Already troubled, he then had to navigate the loss of his mother who died by suicide, when he was eleven years old. In 20017, his father, a driver by profession, moved with the family, which included Faruqui and his three sisters, to Mumbai to make a fresh start.
In Mumbai, Faruqui had to work extremely hard and overcome several obstacles to pursue his love for comedy. “My father fell sick and was bed-ridden from 2008, so I had to take charge from the age of 17. I worked at a utensil store from 2007, while attending school. I taught myself English and Hindi from the newspapers that my boss used to buy, and by watching films,” he told The Hindu.
After arriving in Mumbai, other than working at a utensils store, he worked as a salesman and as a small-time graphic artist while also honing his craft. His first brush with his comedy came when he was covering for an extra for an ad shoot at The Habitat while playing the character of a stand-up comic. The power of speaking his mind with a mic stayed with him, and so started his journey in the world of stand-up comedy. This journey, however, required a lot of dedication.
“While I would do one open mic a night, he would go to four to five every night. Please note that one does not get paid for these performances. You have to pay a token amount to perform, like Rs 200. He would diligently take the local train to go from one place to another, to try out his material and note how the audience was responding to him. He took comedy very seriously, he was that ambitious and hard-working,” his friend Anish told The Quint.
Faruqui’s jokes poked fun at political ideologies, religious symbolization, and the stereotyping of various identities, including that of his own identity as a Muslim. His popularity grew, both online and offline, and his first video titled Politics in India was uploaded on YouTube on January 24, 2020, marking the beginning of a career full of laughs, controversies, and disruptions on behalf of the divine.
His first instance of trouble occurred when multiple FIRs were filed against him in April 2020, with the complainants alleging that he was making fun of Lord Ram in one of his jokes during which he makes fun of the famous Hindi song, Mera Piya Ghar Aaya Oh Ram Ji, from the movie Yaarana (1981). Even while uploading the video, Munawar was sceptical that the particular bit might be a little too much, but he was assured by his friends, including Hindu friends, that people would realize that the joke was on the song and not on the deity. The frenzy and widespread trolling that occurred after that, which eventually fizzled out, proved this prediction to be wrong.
Since that incident, the Indian right-wing has been after Faruqui for the alleged insult he has caused to the Hindu gods and goddesses, Union Minister Amit Shah, and the kar sevaks killed in the Godhra massacre of 2002, during his stand-up sets.
On January 1 2021, amid a 14-city tour around India, Faruqui was arrested, along with Edwin Anthony, Nalin Yadav, Prakhar Vyas and Priyam Vyas. The arrests took place over new allegations of insulting Hindu gods and goddesses during a comedy show in Indore on New Year’s Day – only this time, the allegations were that he will crack such jokes during his show, and not that he had already cracked them. He was jailed after a complaint by a BJP MLA’s son. His lawyer argued that he had not even started his act that day and was just present at the venue, but it didn’t help. A court said the “possibility of more incriminating material could not be ruled out”.
He was only released from prison a month later after the Supreme Court granted him bail and when multiple lower courts had rejected his bail application. While many stand-up comedians rallied behind Munawar then, it was mostly attributed to an attack on the freedom of speech of artists and comedians. However, even after his release, Munawar continued to be hunted down by the defenders of divine immunity from humour.
Even after his release, Munawar was never able to fully reoccupy the stage of political commentary, though he became a topic of many such commentaries. A slew of his shows was cancelled in Mumbai, Goa, and Gujarat, owing to threats from right-wing organizations to hurt the organizers, the audience, or in a particular case, to themselves (by setting themselves to fire). It was the cancellation of a show in Bangaluru that proved to be the final straw in Faruqui’s resolve.
His latest show was scheduled for Bengaluru, and whose proceeds were planned to be sent for charitable purposes, but the show was not granted permission on grounds that it may create a law and order situation.
In an emotionally worded announcement, Faruqui said that, “Hate has won, the artist lost.”
https://twitter.com/munawar0018/status/1464834752234471431
“My name is Munawar Faruqui. And that’s been my time, you guys were (a) wonderful audience. Goodbye, I’m done,” the tweet further said.
While he announced his retirement, many of his peers in the stand-up community provided support to him. However, even as many, including Varun Grover and Kunal Kamra, provided some sort of support, many shied away from mentioning his Muslim identity as an additional reason for his persecution by the boycott mobs. Over social media debates on how Faruqui was being targetted for his Muslim identity, a counter-narrative sprung up mentioning how Zakir Khan, a very popular stand-up comic in the country, is hailed by the same majoritarian community.
The comparison may not have taken into consideration that Faruqui and Khan have very different comic styles and topics, with the former dabbling into the middle-class relatability and the latter drawing from his personal and political experiences to comment upon the present scenario.
What happens next in Faruqui’s journey remains to be seen by all and sundry, but the disruptions in the life of a young Muslim comedian, on causes deemed to be divine by mortals who stand to gain a lot, politically and ideologically, are significant events for India, especially in the light of the shift of India’s cultural tectonic plates. In the words of Sanjay Rajoura, a stand-up comedian, this ordeal might just be the divine’s #NotInMyName moments.
Ansab Aamir is an intern with TwoCircles.net. He tweets at @ansab_amir.