Mumbai: Elvish Yadav has sparked an online debate over feminism following a heated exchange with Tejasswi Prakash on Playground Season 5.
The incident, which saw the YouTuber lose his cool during a discussion with his fellow mentor, has drawn criticism from several social media users, while his fans have come out in his defence.
Elvish Yadav and Tejasswi Prakash are among the mentors on Playground Season 5.
In a recent episode, the two got into a heated exchange after Tejasswi interrupted Elvish while he was speaking. The YouTuber lost his temper and told her, “Shut the f**k up.”
Tejasswi objected to his behaviour, telling him “not to talk to me like that.” Elvish then asked her not to interrupt him while he was speaking.
After a video of the incident surfaced on social media, several users reacted to the exchange and criticised Elvish for his choice of words.
While some users accused Elvish of disrespecting Tejasswi on national television, others criticised his remarks and questioned his conduct towards his female co-mentor.
“As an Elvish Yadav fan, I’m honestly embarrassed. I can support him, but I can’t defend this kind of language or behaviour. This was completely unacceptable 😔,” one user wrote.
“Is this really how he talks to a woman? And then people claim he ‘respects all women.’ Seriously? Telling a woman to ‘shut the fuck up’ is simply disrespectful. If this is how he talks, then what exactly do you mean by ‘respecting women’? There’s no excuse for this,” wrote another.
#ElvishYadav has openly abused tejaswi
Now where are the pseudo feminist???Isn’t this bad behaviour???
Imagine if the same thing Abhishek malhan does then the internet blasts and declare him a women hater
But if it done by L20 then it’s ok..#AbhishekMalhan pic.twitter.com/JjrUxwbe9C
— always abhishek 👑 (@Donotshout1) September 4, 2026
Elvish also addressed the backlash on X on Thursday night, appearing to respond to the criticism surrounding the incident.
“If someone tries to create a ‘boy-girl’ narrative about me on national television, I’m not okay with it and honestly, no one should be. Dragging a gender angle into everything is not cool. I responded in the language that the situation deserved. Giving false interviews and speaking disrespectfully about my fans is unacceptable. And leaking videos from the set just to look cool or to make the other person seem wrong isn’t right either,” he wrote.
Meanwhile, Tejasswi Prakash has not yet commented on the controversy.