Last Week Tonight host John Oliver is not a happy camper these days and with good reason. It can be recalled that his episode, centring around the growing unrest in parts of India over CAA and NRC, where he criticised Modi and his party's work in lieu of the new developments, was not uploaded on Hotstar. And looks like this 'self-censorship' has opened up a can of worms, for more of Oliver's 'Disney characters-based digs' have also fallen for the cut. Well, not us, but Oliver himself said that in his latest episode where he went on to reveal that the Modi episode was not the only one where his content was being censored without his knowledge. The livid comedian not only called out Hotstar big time but also promised the medium that his brand of 'Disney-Facts' digs would not stop coming. John Oliver’s Episode Criticising PM Narendra Modi Goes Missing From Hotstar; Disney India Accused of Indulging in Self-Censorship.

It all started with the show's Modi- special where Oliver had said, "While Modi may have charmed Bear Grylls, the world, and our current president (Donald Trump visited India recently), in India he is an increasingly controversial figure because his government has pursued a steadily escalating persecution of religious minorities." He also went on to say, "Calling Modi the father of India is stupid at best, and dangerous at worst," during the duration of his episode. And all of this led to Hotstar India not streaming the episode altogether and this created quite the uproar.

This also led to Oliver and his team discovering that not just the Modi episode, but a lot of other content from his shows was being 'self-censored' by Hotstar and in his latest episode, John took his own sweet time to call out the streaming platform, a report in Hollywoodreporter.com read.  "What's worse is, it's apparently not even the first time they have censored us," Oliver had said in the episode, with reference to the India Special episode and went on to say, "We've discovered that they've been quietly doing it for a while now, but not for the reason that you might expect." ‘John Oliver’ Trends on Twitter After New Episode of Last Week Tonight Show Covers US President Donald Trump’s India Visit (Watch Video).

Oliver mentioned how a few of his jokes which had Disney character references were taken off from two episodes - a 2019 episode where he had called Mickey Mouse a cocaine addict and another from last year where he had said that Donald Duck's penis is 'shaped like a corkscrew.' The host also went on to say that he had pointed out the truth about the anatomy of real-life ducks.

Oliver then went on to say, "Why did they do that? It's hard to say, but it might be because Hotstar is actually owned by Disney, and they seem extra-sensitive about Disney references. I frankly resent that factually accurate joke being cut out almost more than I resent our Modi episode being pulled."

He also made it very clear that he would continue to include content that he feels, no matter what. "And let me say this to Hotstar right now. If you think that you have to remove anything that reflects poorly on Disney from this show, I have some bad news for you, my friend. I'm fucking Zazu right here," he said.

"Everything that comes out of this beak is a 'Disney Fact.' If I say that Cogsworth [from Beauty and the Beast] collects Nazi memorabilia, guess what? That's canon, baby. That's a 'Disney fucking Fact' right there. And for the foreseeable future, Hotstar, you can look forward to learning a lot more of them on this show because we're going to be sliding them into our stories like Chip and Dale slid into Richard Gere. That's right — 'Disney Fact,' motherfuckers," said Oliver, very determined to not settle.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 09, 2020 12:22 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).