From late bloomer to crowd favorite: Harpriya Bains delights Hyderabad audience

Harpriya Bains talks about comedy the way most people speak about a long lost instinct — something she didn’t chase early but recognised instantly when it arrived. She remembers watching stand-up online around 2016-17 and thinking it looked fun; later, seeing Amit Tandon and Radhika Vaz perform in Goa, she felt something shift. As she says, “It was nice knowing that somebody can say their point of view; they can act and express themselves on stage.” That small spark grew quietly until her mother nudged her with a simple offhand line: “You know you can also do something like this.” That stayed with her long enough to push her onto her first open mic — which happened in Hyderabad — marking the moment she realised she wasn’t just trying something new; she was stepping into something she’d been meant to do all along.

Carry On Mummy transforms the everyday weight of womanhood into a show that insists — brightly, boldly and hilariously — that mother’s keep moving forward anyway

Her early comfort on stage wasn’t new. Plays, theatre, hosting as an Army officer’s wife at Army shows had given her that grounding and performing across cities only sharpened it further, especially now as she brings Carry On Mummy to Hyderabad — the place where it all began. She loves how audiences shift from place to place, but Hyderabad, she mentions, has its own warmth and attentiveness. “That confidence and love of being on stage was there,” she says, and a third-generation Army upbringing — moving every few years, adapting instantly, meeting endless new people — taught her how to read a room even before the first joke lands. Across all cities though, one thing never changed — “all desi mothers are the same,” she laughs, a thread that runs through nearly every beat of her material.

Before stand-up, creativity lived differently in her life — watercolour painting, poetry, even advertising — and she still writes her sets with that same curiosity. “When you’re creative, there are no boundaries,”she shares, and it’s why her jokes stretch across observation, memory and lived chaos. Early on, she noticed men her age talk openly about marriage, kids and everyday frustration on stage, while women her age almost never entered that foray. So, she decided to change that.

That urgency shaped Carry On Mummy, a title she chose because, as she puts it, “no matter what, us mothers have to carry on.” The show is essentially her life compressed into stories, about raising kids, juggling roles, running a home and still being expected to be endlessly cheerful — even on days she didn’t have the energy to. That’s where her branding, CEO H&M — Cribbing, Exhausted, Over-worked Housewife & Mother — came. A line that lands because it’s funny only the way truth is funny. The show pulls from real moments, exhaustion and humour but Harpriya also insists that the heart of it is joy — “I want people to feel good when they leave,” she signs off.

Tickets at ₹499. November 30, 7.30 pm onwards.

At The Comedy Theatre, Gachibowli.

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