Mumbai: Saloni Gaur, an undergrad from the University of Delhi (DU), is among the new voices in the Indian comedy scene. The journey which started in a hostel room is now moving on the fast track with streaming platforms cueing up to have her on board and news channels curious to know how she managed to become the next big thing on social media.
It has been quite a journey for Saloni who began with 100-200 followers and now her Instagram fam has grown over 5 lakh. For Saloni, the lockdown came as a blessing as she observed a complete boom on her social media accounts during this period as people needed sufficient entertainment to weather the lockdown. The pandemic induced lockdown, however, deprived her of tasting the joy of being famous as she like everyone else was confined within four walls of her house in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh. The final year Political Science (Hons) student in an interview had said that the virtual love and appreciation overwhelms her.
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Though people took notice of her talent recently, Saloni has been making videos since 2017. Her first video that went viral was on Delhi's pollution in which she plugged in Katrina Kaif's song 'Saans me teri' from Jab Tak Hai Jaan when a thick blanket of smog had engulfed Delhi making it difficult for people in the state to even breathe. For a couple of days, there was no sign of upward trend but on the fifth day, the video titled 'Nazma Aapi on Delhi's Pollution' caught the attention of netizens and spread like wildfire on social media.
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Besides supportive parents, Saloni has a bouncing board in his brother Shubham, who has appeared in Amazon Prime’s Hostel Days and is a Youtuber. When she did not know how to channel her thoughts into a video, it was her brother who guided her and occasionally helps her in edits. Saloni in her interview had also shared that her comic timing comes from her grandmother who used to crack jokes all the time.
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From impersonating actors like Kangana Ranaut, Sonam Kapoor, Ananya Panday, Sara Ali Khan and politician Shashi Tharoor to playing the characters like Nazma Aapi and Aadarsh Bahu, Saloni has built a brand of her own sans cuss words which most comedians are accused of repleting their gigs with.
When asked how was Nazma Aapi born and didn't she fear backlash playing a Muslim woman, Gaur in an interview had said that she had started with a character called Pinky Dogra a year ago and it was around Eid 2018 when she first thought of Nazma Aapi while making a video on Eid preparations. Saloni's most loved character Nazma Aapi is not inspired by someone in particular but the dialect is inspired by a lot of people.
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Her humour customarily stems from current affairs and things she observes around herself. A brush of political commentary having no leaning to either side saves Saloni from heavy trolling which is inevitable for any content creator.
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A diehard fan of filmmaker Zoya Akhtar, Saloni's next stop is to break into stand-up comedy which is already dominated by men, both in terms of numbers and reach. Meanwhile, she has bagged a show titled Uncommon Sense with Saloni, streaming on SonyLIV. Keeping her USP intact, which is doing satirical comedy through various characters, the show is similar in tone with what she does on social media, but on a grand level.
Gaur's success proves that in the time and age of social media all it needs to attain success is original talent and internet. As rightly depicted in Saloni's favourite director Zoya's 2019 release Gully Boy, where Murad (Ranveer Singh) is asked to make his own graffiti, he writes "Roti, Kapada, Makaan + Internet". This shows how the Internet is empowering young talents who earlier had only Bollywood or television as options but now their dreams know no bounds.
