Chinmayi Sripaada slams Kapil Sharma for ‘racist jibes’ on Atlee: ‘This is not surprising’

Director Atlee joined an episode of The Great Indian Kapil Show with the team of Baby John, including Varun Dhawan, Keerthy Suresh and Wamiqa Gabbi.

Filmmaker Atlee recently appeared as a guest on Kapil Sharma's show, The Great Indian Kapil Show. However, a joke made by Kapil has sparked controversy, with many viewers questioning whether the comedian was making a derogatory comment about Atlee's appearance. Singer Chinmayi Sripaada has now weighed in on the issue, criticising Kapil for allegedly making a joke about Atlee's skin colour.

Chinmayi Sripaada took to social media to express her views.

What happened

Director Atlee appeared on The Great Indian Kapil Show on Saturday to promote his upcoming film, Baby John. He joined the grand finale episode with the film’s team including Varun Dhawan, Keerthy Suresh and Wamiqa Gabbi.

During the conversation, Kapil subtly cracked a joke about Atlee, which didn’t go down well among a section of social media. He asked, “When you get to meet a star for the first time, do they ask, where is Atlee?”

To this, Atlee responded, “In a way I understood your question. I’ll try to answer. I’m actually very thankful to AR Murugadoss sir because he produced my first film. He asked for a script, but he didn’t see how I was looking or whether I’m capable of it or not. But, he loved my narration. I think the world should see that. We should not judge by appearance. You have to judge by your heart.”

The clip from the episode emerged on social media, following which Kapil has been facing backlash for his remarks. The comedian as well as Atlee are yet to react to the stir.

Chinmayi Sripaada hits back

Chinmayi didn’t like the joke either and didn’t mince any words while calling out Kapil. She took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to share her views.

Reposting a clip from the show, Chinmayi wrote, “Will they never stop these crass and racist jibes at his skin colour in the name of ‘comedy’?”

“Someone with the amount of influence and clout like Kapil Sharma saying something like this is disappointing and unfortunately, not surprising,” she added.

In fact, several of the Jawan director’s fans were also not pleased by the remark and expressed their disappointment on social media.

One Twitter user wrote, “I watched this episode this afternoon. I was thinking the same. Maybe be his intention was not that but then he should have framed the question in much much better way. But all in all he is a champion of body shaming so not surprising at all."

“Kapil Sharma may be a nice person otherwise, but he makes racist/sexist/body shaming/homophobic jokes all the time on his show. His silly question to Atlee reflects the fair-skin colour obsession of North Indians,” another wrote.