The Pune police on Thursday registered an FIR against the participants of the controversial 'AIB Roast' show, which featured Bollywood director Karan Johar and actors Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor.
The complainant in the case is a police inspector with Pune CID, Vazir Hussain Sheikh. Sheikh told PTI that he filed the first information report in his personal capacity, finding the show to be "inimical to the Indian culture".
The video of the show went viral on YouTube. It was, however, later taken down from YouTube after protests erupted over the use of expletives and sexually explicit jokes and the Maharashtra government ordered a probe.
On Sheikh's complaint, the Bund Garden police here today registered FIR under IPC sections 292 (distribution of obscene content), 294 (obscene act in public place) and Section 67(a) (publishing or transmitting of material containing sexually explicit act, etc in electronic form) of the Information Technology Act, a police officer said. The accused may face 5 to 10 years of imprisonment and fine upto Rs.2 Lakh if convicted.
The FIR names Karan Johar, Ranveer Singh, Arjun Kapoor, Deepika Padukone (she was part of audience) and comedians Abish Mathew, Tanmay Bhat, Aditi Mittal, Simran Khamba, Ashish Shakya, Raghu Ram, Rohan Joshi, and film critic Rajeev Masand, and others, the officer added.
"The way I look at it, I think it was in a good humour. Not meant to be taken very seriously. This is my opinion and someone else may have a different opinion about it and that is the beauty of a living in a democratic setup," actress Anushka Sharma told reporters here. Her cricketer boyfriend Virat Kohli had been the butt of jokes during the controversial comedy show.
The celebrity roast, the first of its kind in India which featured a panelist of AIB members with filmmaker Karan Johar taking over the role of 'roast master' to grill 'Gunday' stars Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor on their professional and personal lives, sparked a controversy for obscene language and content.
"This has been made unnecessarily a big issue and it's not needed. There are many more important things which people are dealing with and fighting for," she added.
The AIB roast event, staged in Mumbai in December, was attended by 4,000 people and the audience included Johar's mother, Sonakshi Sinha, Alia Bhatt, Deepika Padukone and Anurag Kashyap among others. The programme was based on US-style roast shows where celebrities are abused and insulted. It is facing the heat in India for its "below the belt" jokes and "abusive language".