TikToker shows how Guneet Monga was cut off at Oscars while others were allowed to go on

Guneet Monga and Kartiki Gonsalves won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short for The Elephant Whisperers. Even as the win scripted history for India, many also noticed that Guneet was cut off from the stage as she was going to deliver her acceptance speech. Now a user on TikTok shared a video claiming that the Academy showed no such time stamp for the speech when another ‘white British’ man won the Oscar a few moments later. (Also read: Oscars may have passed but All That Breathes’ impact will continue: Guneet Monga pens note for Shaunak Sen)

When The Elephant Whisperes won the Oscar for Best Documentary Short, both Kartiki and Guneet took the stage to accept the award. Kartiki then took 43 seconds to deliver her speech, saying: “I stand here today to speak for the sacred bond between us and our natural world, for the respect of indigenous communities, and empathy towards other living beings we share space with and finally, for coexistence. Thank you to the Academy for recognising our film, highlighting indigenous people and animals.” Then, as Guneet was about to speak, the music started playing and she was cut off from delivering her speech.

In a recent video that was shared on Twitter and which has since gone viral, TikTok user @/iam7evn pointed out that although Guneet’s speech was cut short due to the 45-seconds acceptance speech rule, no such treatment was meted out to the next set of award winners. The video highlighted the next set of awards which were for the category Best Animated Short that went to Charles Mackesy and Matthew Freud for The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse. Their speech extended more than 45 seconds but it was not cut off.

Many users expressed their shock at the video and left comments in the microblogging site. One user wrote: “I noticed this too and it pissed me off. Listen till the end to hear what we missed that night. #Oscar2023” A comment read: “The documentary about Navalny also got tons of time to accept AND his wife got to speak so… yes, it’s very wrong that they cut off this Indian woman’s acceptance speech. Like foul.” Another user said, “y’all this genuinely pissed me off. it’s more so just sad than anything else. she was standing there with her phone out when the music played over her and her speech was so beautiful.” Another comment read, “This angers me in ways I can’t explain.”

The clip did go ahead and include Guneet’s speech that she spoke late in that ceremony, “Tonight is historic! This is the first Oscar for any Indian production and two women here won this… I just want to say to everyone watching, the future is audacious and the future is us and the future is here.”