Popular Comedy channel AIB- All India Bakchod Bids Adieu to Fans with a Twitter Post!

It's been almost six months since #MeToo movement caught momentum in India. Amongst the ones that came under its force, was AIB, a content creation platform started by Tanmay Bhat, Gursimran Khamba, Ashish Shakya and Rohan Joshi. But due to a sexual allegation raised against Gursimran and events following in line, AIB has decided to shut down entirely.

AIB on Twitter posted a letter to all it's fans. 

Here is what they wrote:

It's been a long several months for us at AIB. But before we get to the updates, we'd just like to say thank you to everyone who reached out to us. While we may have not been able to reply to everyone, please know that we are immensely grateful.

After the events of early October, things moved fast. Almost all of our partners hit freeze on future associations, while others pulled out of active projects effective immediately. 

All of this hit revenue hard.

We've always prided ourselves on being hundred percent independent, creator owned company. We've been free to choose our own destiny and set our own content standards as a result of this independence. However the flip side of this is that with business going to zero, the lack of revenue inflow made it impossible for us, as owners, to sustain outgoing costs. 

To be clear, we weren't randomly reckless or fast and loose with our money. We had invested a lot of our profits over the last few years including those from our personal individual projects into building the content house of our dreams. But with no incoming revenue and operational costs piling up, we had to make some hard and unfortunately permanent decisions. 

We had two let our office space and entire team go overnight. Production, creative, admin all of it. This was particularly hard not just because making people laugh with us is a ton of fun but because we had to say goodbye to some of the finest minds in the field, people we'd build dreams with for many years. One small point of pride in all this for us is that with the work they had done at AIB,  not one of them struggled to find another job. 

However, to that end, the AIB YouTube channel is for all intents and purposes, dead for the foreseeable future. There will be no new sketches anytime soon. It sucks but it is what it is. If and when we decide to release another content on the channel (for e.g stand up clips), you will be the first to know. 

We'd also like to state that we at AIB have had an IC and anti-harassment system in place from the start. However, we recognise that the culture at work may not have been perfect but simply put, we need to be better. To that end, we maintain that Tanmay Bhat's lapse of judgement regarding Utsav Chakraborty was egregious. As a result, even though Tanmay Bhat's suspension has been lifted, he will no longer hold the position of CEO. 

With regards to Gursimran Khamba, an external committee was appointed to look into the allegations made against him in October. The EC comprised of two experienced senior members, a senior partner at a law firm and a diversity consultant and its mandate was to conduct a fair investigation into the matter. As required in such cases, the proceedings remain confidential.

However, during the course of the investigation, we were informed that Gursimran Khamba had stepped away from the process citing issues with procedure. The EC was unable to conclude the investigation on account of his withdrawal. Given the circumstances, Gursimran Khamba will no longer be involved in operations at AIB and will be working independent of us. 

Rohan Joshi and Ashish Shakya will continue to manage the remaining affairs at AIB, but will also be pursuing solo interest in the coming future.

While we may not have a complete roadmap yet, we are sure of one thing going forward- we never want to stop entertaining. Making people laugh has been the great privilege of our lives and we hope to be able to keep doing that in whatever new form the future holds for us. 

So once again thank you for letting us into your world. It has been an honor. 

Will you miss AIB? Let us know in comments below...