Comedian Krushna Abhishek on Wednesday defended "Comedy Nights Bachao", a show that he co-hosts, after Tannishtha Chatterjee rued its "regressive and blatantly racist" ways of finding humour in her "dark skin tone".
He has, however, apologised to the actress.
Krushna was not present on the sets of the show when Tannishtha was "roasted" on the comedy show. She was accompanied on the show by her "Parched" team members, actress Radhika Apte and director Leena Yadav on Tuesday. A day after she shot for the show, Tannishtha took to social media to slam the format for its racist attack.
Reacting to it, Krushna told the media here: "If she (Tannishtha) feels offended by something, I apologise from our side. We never want to hurt anyone deliberately. 'Comedy Nights Bachao' is of a roast format. Roast doesn't mean that we say just anything to anyone...
"I had asked Tannishtha, if she has seen the show, she said she doesn't watch TV as such. So, she has no clue about the show. So I took another example and asked her if she had seen AIB Roast? And she hadn't seen that either. I told her that since it's a roast, there will be some leg pulling, but we don't insult. Had we been insulting, the show won't have come so far."
The actress has said that she had some inkling of a roast courtesy "Saturday Night Live" show, and that with "Comedy Nights Bachao", she was looking forward to be 'roasted' as her perception was that a roast is "a celebratory humour at someone's expense" and "a mock counter to a toast".
Pointing out that the only thing they could roast about a dark-skinned actress was "of course her dark skin", she said in a Facebook post: "This was an entirely novel understanding of roast that equates itself with bullying. And to my utmost horror, I soon realised that the only quality they found worth roasting about in me was my skin tone. It began with, 'Aap ko jamun bahut pasand hoga zaroor...?'"
Krushna said the new second season of "Comedy Nights Bachao" has been mellowed down due to its film integrations.
"When a show comes, 90 per cent people praise the show, but then 10 per cent say they didn't like it. So maybe she didn't like the format," said the nephew of comedy star Govinda.
Krushna said there are actors who take roasts sportingly.
"When Varun Dhawan came for 'Dilwale', Varun himself came up to me and said that he is very excited and looking forward to the roast. Even SRK chose to come to our show for 'Fan'.
"I don't know what hurt Tannishtha, because I wasn't performing then. But I apologise if it has hurt her, though it wasn't a deliberate attempt," he added.
Women's Panel Slams TV Show For Comments On Actress Tannishtha's Skin Tone
The National Commission for Women today slammed a comedy TV show for allegedly making fun of the skin tone of actress Tannishtha Chatterjee and said it is exploring avenues to initiate action on the "unfortunate episode".
NCW chief Lalitha Kumaramangalam said it was "deplorable" and "pathetic" that the TV show "stooped to such a low level to garner TRPs".
"This was wrong on so many levels, in gender construct and social construct and it sets a very bad precedent. It is in bad taste and condemnable. In the name of freedom of expression, one should not and cannot allow perpetuation of social prejudice," Ms Kumaramangalam told.
She said the NCW has taken cognisance of the incident and by tomorrow it will initiate action on the "unfortunate episode".
"We are consulting our lawyers to determine our own course of action. And, tomorrow we will also issue a letter to the apex authority on monitoring of the broadcast media content, to bring to their notice the episode," she said.
As a part of the promotions for her recently released film "Parched", Tannishtha along with director Leena Yadav and co-star Radhika Apte had gone to show -- Comedy Nights Bachao.
The actress, in a lengthy Facebook post, wrote about her frustration with the way her skin complexion was targeted by the comics on the show.
The 35-year-old actress said she initially tried to go along with the show, but could not tolerate the "offensive" jokes after a point.
"I could not believe I was sitting in a nationally televised comedy show in 2016 in Mumbai amid such regressive (I can't call it humour), and blatantly racist content.
Though I was feeling suffocated, I decided to give it another chance, and sat through another equally offensive segment," the actress wrote on Facebook.
The NCW chief said, "What kind of language was that, using jamun as a reference to her skin tone? I dare if the host would use the same kind of language for any male actor? It was in poor taste."
She further said, "The roasting as they say, cannot be done on gender and caste lines. It is unfortunate."
Replying to her post, the TV channel Colors wrote it has always addressed pertinent social issues and was sad that she had a traumatic experience on the show.
