If you are someone who likes to stay in touch with all things comedy and specifically up-to-date with the Indian stand-up comedy scene, Dead Ant is your one stop solution. Their bio states, “Dead Ant is your all-access pass to standup, and India’s first entertainment, news and new media company dedicated to comedy.”
The outlet has been active on Facebook and Twitter since 2017, and was founded by Ravina Rawal, who is also its editor, and has previously worked with several youth-focused media channels in India. Nita Joshi is its COO and Head of HR.
“Dead Ant is an iconic and terrible joke from the 90s. Geddit?” It is onomatopoeia.
Dead Ant debuted on Instagram around two years ago and has amassed a large following. It announced “Dead Ant is now (a)live.”, kicking off its website in late 2020. Arjuna Shankar is the in-house coder or ‘Technical Antmaster’ as the website puts it, while Ravish Rawal is working on the soon to release Dead Ant App.
Currently the website covers all news pertaining to comedy, reviews of shows, films, and stand-up specials, interviews with independent comedians and comedy collectives, and opinion pieces from guest writers as well as the DA staff.
On Twitter and Instagram, the outlet goes by the name DeadAntCo and regularly tweets and posts about comedy from around the world, provides information on comedy shows happening in major Indian cities, shares behind the scene stories, and does a great job in compiling funny and witty tweets and other forms of responses on trending topics.
Here is a swipe post from its Instagram handle that lists a few responses that emerged soon after Rihanna’s tweet regarding the farmers’ protests.
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Recently they have turned their focus on ‘Decade of comedy’ in India; interviewing comedians, holding discussions, documenting the evolution and journey in various ways. Their most recent YouTube video on this topic featuring comedians Abhishek Upmanyu, Anu Menon, Karthik Kumar, Neeti Palta, Rohan Joshi, and Vir Das was released on 22nd January and has more than 1 Lakh views.