Shirish Kunder would like to do on Twitter what RK Laxman did on canvas. Kunder has made a name for himself – not just as Farah Khan’s husband – through his constant display of opinion on Twitter. In an interview to The Indian Express, Kunder described his Twitter commentary as his way of dealing with anger.
All satirists, Kunder is sure, are angry people. The popular belief is that Kunder himself is an avid satirist. His anger is fueled by the communal atmosphere in the country – “this whole Hindu-Muslim thing”.
“All those closet Muslim-haters were always around, but now suddenly it is coming out.”
He adds:
A [college] roommate of mine was from the ABVP. If a Muslim or Christian friend would come to our room, he would walk out immediately. So I have seen how their minds are poisoned.
But that is not the only reason he tweets against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s student wing.
Kunder claims that the BJP lost even when the truckload of students were made to vote twice on the same day. The revelatory tweet is buried deep in his timeline.
His favourite tweet, however, is from 2015 and enjoys the proud position on the top of his twitter handle which has 263,000 followers.
Even though Kunder claims that he broke a self-imposed rule of not tweeting about his own industry while he tweeted about Anupam Kher, he argues that Kher was making a political statement himself.
Given that Aamir Khan had to appeal to Kunder’s other favourite Twitter-target, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the issue indeed was less about Bollywood and more political in nature. He had said:
Those who speak of breaking up this vast country, such people are present in all religions, only Modi Ji can stop them. After all, Modi Ji is our Prime Minister, we have to tell him.
Not just Modi, Kunder doesn’t spare his wife Farah Khan either.
His image of being Farah Khan’s husband does not bother him, Kunder says in the interview. An editor by profession, Kunder agrees that dating her brought him to the limelight. Talking about his career, he says:
I married someone eight years older. She was at the peak of her career. There will come a time I will be better.
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