The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has sought action against stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra regarding his Twitter post of a “doctored” video that features a minor boy, singing to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In a letter obtained by Silverscreen India, the Commission has asked Twitter to take down the video immediately, and submit a report of subsequent actions taken against the comedian within seven days. The letter has been sent to the Delhi Police, as well.
It was reported that the NCPCR had received a complaint about the video on Thursday, alleging that Kamra posted the video “to further his own political agendas.”
“The Commission has taken cognisance of the complaint, and is of the view that using minors for propagating political ideologies is a violation of the provisions of the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015 and The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. Further, the Commission is apprehensive that using children for such promotional purposes is harmful and detrimental to their mental well-being.”
The now deleted video shared by the comedian, was related to a video of Modi in Germany, from his recent three-day visit to Europe, which featured a boy singing Hey Janmabhoomi Bharat to him. Kamra reportedly re-shared the video, while replacing the song with Mehengayi daayan khaaye jaat hain.
The boy’s father, Ganesh Pol, responded to Kamra’s post and wrote, “He is my 7 year old son, who wanted to sing this song for his beloved motherland. Though he is still very young but certainly he loves his country more than you Mr. Kamra or Kachra, whatever you are. Keep the poor boy out of your filthy politics and try to work on your poor jokes.
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To which Kamra replied, “The video is in the public domain by a news organisation. The joke is not on your son, while you enjoy your son sing for his motherland to the most popular son, there are songs that he should listen to from people of his country also.”
Later, the comedian also shared a meme and wrote, “The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights must act for on me for a MEME, that I said who did this for.”
“Now they’ll download the video and circulate it as “THE HEIGHTS THE LEFT GOES TO FOR HATING PMO” & forget all about the KID,” he wrote.