A light-hearted take on cancer: 11 ‘warriors’ share their experiences and a laugh

“What’s more dangerous than cancer?” Ruchi Chadha asked the audience that had gathered to watch ‘Comedy in Chaos’ on Saturday. As she received confused glances in response, she quipped, “People… Kuch toh log toh kahenge, logo ka kaam hai kehna… (People will say something or the other… it’s just their job to talk aimlessly).” Chadha, who was the presenter at the show, shared with the crowd how she had lost her mother to breast cancer and the suffering that came along.

Among the 11 “cancer warriors” — residents of Delhi aged between 32 and 62 — who performed at the show at the India International Centre was Rohini Khuller (62), who conceptualised the event. Their experiences, emotions, moments of weakness, and stories of people who gave them the strength that they needed in the fight against cancer were weaved into jokes, anecdotes and conversations shared during the event — all while making people laugh in their seats.

“I want to normalise conversations around cancer,” Khuller told The Indian Express after the show, which, she said, had been in the making for nearly five years. Diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020, Khuller has been serving as the director of a consultancy, Turning Point Learning Pvt Ltd, since 2011 after serving as a sales and marketing professional for nearly 15 years.

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Dressed in a grey kurta, glasses perched upon her nose, she said emphatically, “I hate the word survivor”. Introducing her fellow performers during the show, she said, “These are the folks who’ve had a tryst with cancer…”

“The show actively started taking root in April after I had put up a message on our group that I wanted to organise a stand-up comedy event. Suddenly, I was flooded with messages with people saying ‘count me in’,” she recounted.

The play was centered on a patient’s emotions and experiences following diagnosis.

Saturday’s event was divided in three segments, opening with a talk show where “warriors” Nandita Thakur (59), Jenus Pannu Kohli (45) and Ujala Makhija (46) spoke of “people who tell you to be positive all the time”. “Mai toh triple positive thi yaar (I was three times positive…),” said Kohli in jest, referring to her diagnosis of three types of breast cancer in 2003. In 2025, she was diagnosed with an advanced stage of brain cancer. She is currently undergoing treatment.

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In a play, the second segment of the event, that she had written, “warrior” Manisha Kapur (56) played the lead, donning the role of Manu Punjabi — “a woman from Punjab who just got diagnosed with breast cancer”.

The play was centered on a patient’s emotions and experiences following diagnosis. “I started writing with 20-21 medical terms, and then wove them into the story… Manu misunderstands them in her own way,” said Kapur.

With hairfall being a common side effect of chemotherapy, the third segment was called, “Bal bal bach gaye, but bal nahi bache.” (It was a close shave… yet lost hair). The “warriors” shared their first-hand experience of undergoing chemotherapy.

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Thakur recalled shaving her head, “They called me baldilocks,” she told the audience, referring to the name inspired from the protagonist of a fairytale.

During the segment moderated by Rajneesh Singh (62), the only man in the group of 11 and a colon cancer patient, Khuller, Shruti Dhruva (56) and the youngest in the group— Astha Funda (32) — spoke of how their uncles and aunties, who “graduated from the Whatsapp university”, started advising them that if they drank haldi doodh (turmeric milk) all would be okay.

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“When the idea came up of a light-hearted take on cancer, I thought it could be a great way of normalising conversations about cancer. But at the same time, I was worried whether it could be done in a sensitive manner. It’s great to see this group narrate a humorous yet empathetic take on their experiences.” said Dr Aditi Chaturvedi, Breast Oncoplastic Surgeon at Apollo Hospital, Delhi, who attended the event.

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The evening ended with a band, Dirty Class, performing a song written by Kapur — ‘Sab Kuch Changa Hai Ji (all is well) — and all the “cancer warriors” dancing, singing and rejoicing. More than 100 people in the audience — including friends, family and doctors of the “warriors” — cheered along.