Comedian and Flagrant co-host Akaash Singh is facing a lawsuit from a man who attended one of his live stand-up performances, and Singh is making it very clear he has no plans to back down.
Singh addressed the legal situation directly in a recent video, revealing that the lawsuit stems from a segment he posted online called “Spotting Dumb Indians,” which involved crowd work from one of his shows.
The man at the center of the lawsuit, whom Singh refers to only as “Prateek” while acknowledging that is likely not his real name, had purchased VIP tickets to the performance before taking legal action.
“Guys, I’m getting sued,” Singh said plainly at the top of his video, before diving into the full story.
What seems to frustrate Singh most is not the lawsuit itself, but the way it was handled. He made clear that a private conversation could have resolved everything before attorneys ever got involved. “If this guy had just messaged me privately and said, hey man, I thought I’d be okay with that clip, I’m not, can you please take it down, I probably would have,” Singh said.
Instead, the matter escalated quickly. Singh noted that he had to contact his agency just to inform them of the situation, a step he found entirely unnecessary given what he sees as a straightforward dispute between two people.
“What are you doing? Getting them involved. Guys, I’m just trying to have a fun time,” he said.
Central to Singh’s defense is a disclaimer he says he delivers at the start of nearly every performance. “Hey guys, I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings. So if you feel like I cross a line or if you just don’t want to be talked to, give me this move and I will move on,” he explains to his audiences. He also routinely follows up with a note of gratitude, telling crowds: “I’m so grateful that you guys bought tickets. I don’t want anyone to walk away upset.”
Singh also pointed to the VIP ticket purchase as a telling detail. “Part of the reason I charge extra money is because people will pay to be made fun of. They will literally get upset at me for not making fun of them,” he said. He added that the attendee’s appearance naturally drew attention during the crowd work portion of the set, which he interpreted as an invitation for light-hearted engagement.
Singh has also been making adjustments to his content independently of this situation. He mentioned that he began blurring women’s faces in his videos after noticing that comment sections were becoming far more aggressive toward the individuals featured than he ever intended.
“The comments she was getting were just so crazy and far beyond what I wanted for her. And I was like, yo, this is messed up. I don’t want this,” he said.
Now that the matter has entered legal territory, Singh says his position has shifted. What he might have let go privately has become a matter of principle. “Now if I back down, I’m not standing up for my own freedom of speech, which is something I believe in,” he said.
He addressed Prateek directly on the point: “If you want to make this a legal thing, if you want to battle over freedom of speech with it’s just a constitutional thing, you’re gonna try, you’re gonna have a flimsy case. You’re gonna spend a lot of money on lawyers. I will do it out of principle.”
Singh made his terms simple. He will not remove the video unless Prateek apologizes and withdraws the lawsuit. Otherwise, his representatives will handle things from there. He ended on a characteristically dry note, asking fans to come out to his upcoming Radio City show to help cover his legal fees, and adding that he hopes any court appearances can be handled over Zoom.
The reaction online largely sided with Singh. Many observers found the concept of taking legal action against a comedian after voluntarily purchasing tickets to a live comedy show to be a perfect illustration of how personal accountability has eroded in recent years.
Regulars at his shows pointed out that his pre-show disclaimer is consistent and well-known, and that sitting close to the stage at a crowd-work heavy performance has always come with an understanding of what that means.
The lawsuit arrives at an already turbulent time for Singh. His wife, Jasleen Singh, recently spoke publicly about a separate wave of online backlash that the couple faced, suggesting the hostility was not entirely organic.
“It was very clear to see that there was a lot of bot farming as well. And I could tell there were bots because the 1500 followers I gained on Instagram, I immediately lost within the span of two months,” she said, describing an unusual spike and drop pattern on her social media account. She also noted that many of the harshest comments on her posts disappeared on their own, without her deleting them.
Akaash publicly backed his wife following her podcast appearance, sharing a clip of her speaking about the early years of his career when circumstances were difficult. “To everyone who says she doesn’t support me: where was your support 8 years ago? Hers was there,” he wrote.
