AIB on Wednesday announced that the channel will not be producing content anymore. The statement read no new sketches will be presented due to no incoming revenue and operational costs piling up.
The makers shared a statement online that also revealed, Tanmay Bhat will no longer be their CEO, and Gursimran Khamba will not be associated with them anymore. The channel was suspended last October after complaints of not acting against sexual harassment allegations made regarding Utsav Chakraborty.
The statement posted on social media by AIB read, “With no incoming revenue and operational costs piling up, we had to make some hard and unfortunately permanent decisions. We had to let our office space and entire team go overnight. Production, creative, administration, all of it… the AIB YouTube channel is for all intents and purposes, dead for the foreseeable future — there will be no new sketches anytime soon.”
“If and when we decide to release other content on the channel (for example standup clips), you will be the first to know.” they added.
Talking about the actions taken against Khamba, one of the four key members of the collective, was accused of sexual misconduct by a woman, the statement said Internal Committee and Anti-Harassment system in place from the start, “However, we recognise that the culture at work may not have been perfect and simply put, we need to be better. To that end, we maintain that Tanmay Bhat’s lapse of judgment regarding Utsav Chakraborty was egregious. As a result, even though Tanmay Bhat’s suspension has been lifted, he will no longer hold a position of CEO.”
They later appointed an external committee to look into the allegations made against Khamba in October 2018. Khamba then stepped away from the process citing issues with the procedure and “The EC was unable to conclude the investigation on account of his withdrawal. Given these circumstances, Gursimran Khamba will no longer be involved in operations at AIB, and will be working independent of us.”
Other memebers Rohan Joshi and Ashish Shakya will continue to look after the channel’s remaining affairs.
