Kunal Kamra is no stranger to testing the promise of free speech in India. He has been banned by Indigo Airlines, received a notice from the National Child Rights Commission, had contempt proceedings initiated against him by the Supreme Court of India, in addition to well over a decade of trolling he has received online. With some success, he has also challenged the Union government’s IT Rules, which attempted to give them considerable monopoly over fact-checking on the internet. 

This time around, Kamra’s latest stand-up comedy special ‘Naya Bharat’ released on YouTube, has placed him in the centre of yet another free speech storm. Quite apart from the criminal prosecutions initiated against Kamra for the alleged offences of ‘public mischief’ and criminal defamation, T-Series has launched a copyright strike on YouTube on the tenuous basis that a few of Kamra’s parody songs in the show violate T-Series’ copyright on some of the underlying musical works. 

Towards the end of his show, Kamra poignantly holds up a copy of the Constitution of India, confident that “this is what allows [him] to do what [he] do[es], and [with]in the framework of this book, you can do anything”. This, again, is not inaccurate, even if recent events have not made it feel like so. Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution, subject to reasonable restrictions imposed under Article 19(2), guarantees the freedom of speech of expression. 

The week of the release of Kamra’s show also saw the Supreme Court underscoring that free speech, including unpopular speech, is integral to a healthy democracy. In Imran Pratapgadhi v. State of Gujarat (2025), the Supreme Court, speaking through Justice Abhay S. Oka, observed that:

“literature including… stand-up comedy, satire and art, make the lives of human beings more meaningful.”. The Court went on to hold that “75 years into our republic, we cannot be seen to be so shaky on our fundamentals that mere recital of a poem or for that matter, any form of art or entertainment, such as, stand-up comedy, can be alleged to lead to animosity or hatred amongst different communities. Subscribing to such a view would stifle all legitimate expressions of view in the public domain which is so fundamental to a free society. 

Worth noting, however, is that the Constitution and the fundamental rights contained within them predominantly protect an individual from the actions of the state, not from other private individuals. While state repression of dissenting voices has........

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