Laughing all the way to the Net
Soaring onion prices are being
lampooned on the Internet -- a
reflection of a new breed of
humour writers who're running
riot on the web, chuckles Reena
Martins
She's not cryin' anymore, Can't afford you is what she says;
There's a smile upon her face; Tomatoes took my place...
She's Not Cryin' Anymore...
This ditty, composed by Goa's humour writer Cecil Pinto (with
due apologies to Billy Ray Cyrus), is an ode to the onion,
which has become the butt of Internet and WhatsApp jokes over
the past few weeks.
As the pricey bulb graces a ring in cyber space -- pictured
like a ruby over a band -- one can't help but wonder about the
funny bones behind the thriving Internet satire that leaves
the user hungry for more. As one Facebook satire page says,
Bahut bhook lagee hai yaar, subah se kuch nahi khaya (I'm
very hungry, haven't eaten anything all day).
These days, there is a joke for every occasion. The
rising price of onions has been lampooned in varied
ways. A cartoon being circulated on the Internet
has a couple asking for two kilos of onions,
prompting the vegetable seller to suspiciously ask
them for their PAN card number. The latest joke
doing the rounds is a WhatsApp message with the
header, "Today's currency exchange rate". It says:
1 dollar = 765g onions; 1 Euro = 1.15g onions, 1
rupee = 12g onions.
Cartoons from newspapers are scanned and circulated, as
humour writers -- college students, advertising executives
and others -- let their imagination run riot, thinking of
funny one liners on topical issues.
"There is this new breed of humour writers that is cutting
edge," says Kunal Vijaykar, co-host of the television show
The Week That Wasn't. "Even though Cyrus (Broacha) and I were
the ones to start the irreverent humour trend, I feel jealous
when I see this flurry of WhatsApp jokes, 90 per cent of
which are very funny and come out within hardly a couple of
hours of a newsbreak. We have to rewrite our TV script as we
can't repeat the damn jokes!"
Most of the jokes are targeted at politicians.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's tours across the
world have evoked considerable mirth. "I don't
believe in maps, satellites and NASA,' says one
message, and then goes on to add, just above Modi's
smiling photograph, "I will travel myself to prove
that the world is round."
A lot of the humour is focused on Rahul Gandhi's lack of
political experience. "We must work for the party," Sonia
Gandhi says in one such joke. "Oh, who's throwing it," asks
an excited Rahul.
Political satire can take the form of innovative laws too.
That's how US-based political satirist Nishant Jain pokes fun
at the system.
On his five-year-old Facebook page Testimonial Comics (with
close to 9,000 likes), Jain this week drafted a
Whistleblower's Protection Act "to protect lewd, perverted
whistleblowers who make innocent ministers feel unsafe in
their armored cars (with police escorts and barricades)
composed almost exclusively of sacks of black money".
It adds: "No minister or official in any governmental
capacity need ever be afraid of loud, prejudiced, aggressive
individuals eager to blow whistles at them just because they
were walking across the street to exchange briefcases full of
money from the corporation of their choice."
Jain points out that the "bandwagon of humour" has got bigger
now that the Internet has "exploded all over" cell phones,
laptops and tablets. "I regularly read stuff that makes me
insanely jealous of the writer behind it," adds Jain, who
holds a master's degree in bio-mechanical engineering.
Some of the jokes can be wildly irreverent. Take
this one, which says: After the grand success of
Coffee with Karan, xxx (television company) is
coming up with three new shows: 1: Tea with Modi 2:
Cerelac with Rahul 3: Cough syrup with Kejriwal.
Thank God, it goes on to add, Morarji Desai is dead.
A lot of the humour is on blogs. Actor Twinkle Khanna's blog
entries -- where she takes on, with subtle humour, issues
such as the ban on beef in Maharasthra or the hush-hush world
of menstruation -- are now out as a book.
Architect and humour writer Clement de Sylva's blog
Bandrabuggers is a hugely popular book written in
pidgin English. De Sylva, who has been writing for
10 years, says that positive responses never stop
pouring in from those in his neighbourhood of Bandra.
There are occasions when people take exception to a joke.
Most of Pinto's funny posts centre on family and Goan village
life, so every once in a while he gets accosted by someone
taking offence at something he has written. "I try to be
sensitive and not hurt anyone's feelings, but that's not
always possible. Political correctness and humour don't go
