
BharatPe founder, Ashneer Grover has landed in a controversy after he asked a comedian, Aashish Solanki to remove a segment from a roast video that he was part of. The incident did not go down well with social media users, who are now calling Grover's behaviour "dictatorial".
Ashneer Grover was part of comedian Aashish Solanki's 'Pretty Good Roast Show', where Solanki, the winner of Comicstaan 3, humorously roasted Grover regarding his removal as managing director of BharatPe. A clip from the show, featuring Solanki's roast of Grover, went viral.
"TV pe log talent dikhane jaat hai, ye aukat dikha ke aa gaya. Samajh gaye kiski baat kar raha hoon main? Apni company se kaun nikala jata hai yaar (People show their talent on TV, he showed everyone his status. Which entrepreneur gets kicked out of their own company?)," Solanki said.
Solanki's reference was to BharatPe expelling Ashneer Grover as the managing director in 2022 over alleged embezzlement of funds by his family members. The legal proceedings pertaining to this case are currently ongoing.
As the joke did not sit well with Grover, the entrepreneur asked Solanki to cut his part from the episode as he was offended by the roast.
In a new post on X and Instagram, Solanki said the full episode was removed from YouTube as he did not have "money to fight a legal battle".
"Ep 5 of Pretty Good Roast hata diya hai doston. Legal battle ladne ka paisa nahi hai. Sab show pe laga diya tha (The episode has been removed as I don't have money to fight a legal battle. I used up all of my money for this show)," the tweet read.
"The response of previous episodes led us to believe our audiences were ready for roast humour. However, it seems that some, especially those in power, are not quite there yet," he added.
Since the video has been deleted from YouTube and Solanki's Instagram page, the former Shark Tank judge has been facing outrage. One user tweeted, "Made Ashish delete the whole video. Peak Doglapan (hypocrite)," a user tweeted, referring to the word made famous by Grover during an episode of Shark Tank.
"Why did he even attend a freaking roast show if he can't handle the roasting!!" A third called him "the Rakhi Sawant of the star-tup world," another tweet read.