From “Chai pe charcha” to “Maggi with chocolate”, the internet has never run out of ways to turn an ordinary day into a joke. While some memes make us laugh out loud, others make us nod because they are painfully true. And when a global tech giant like Microsoft goes down for two days, you can be sure that netizens will not sit quietly. Still not convinced? Meet what may be the funniest explanation for the Microsoft outage so far.
A video is making the rounds on social media, in which a man claims to know exactly who is behind the Microsoft outage. The clip, which is now going viral, was originally posted on Instagram by @the_cpians on 12 November, just as Outlook, Teams and Copilot kept refusing to load for millions of users worldwide. The video is only 14 seconds long, and it starts with a label on the screen that reads “Microsoft outage”.
Looking straight into the camera, the man says in Hindi: “I am telling you for sure, the problem Microsoft is having today was created by some Bihari. He wasn’t getting leave to go home for Chhath. Today was the first day of Chhath, so he got the whole of Microsoft shut down.” He ends the clip with a warning for every manager out there: “That’s why they say, don’t mess with Biharis, especially at Chhath time.”
While posting the video, the creator wrote in the caption, “Ek bihari sab pe bhaari”, a popular line of Bihari pride that means one Bihari is a match for everyone. The caption also carries hashtags for the Microsoft outage, Microsoft 365, Chhath Puja and Bihari. So far, the video has garnered more than 42,000 likes and about 735 comments.
Take a look at the video here:
Video: @the_cpians on Instagram (embedded; the video remains the creator’s property).
As soon as the clip was uploaded, users flooded the comment section with laughing emojis and one-liners. One user wrote, “Ek Bihari Microsoft pe bhaari.” Another turned to the festival, commenting in Hindi, “Jai Chhathi Maiya, whoever did it, please protect them, and may they never get caught.” One comment read, “Credit khud chalkar aata hai”, a nod to the way people line up to take credit for success and disappear when there is blame. Many others reacted to the video with a row of crying-with-laughter emojis.
The joke works because the timing is perfect. Chhath Puja sends lakhs of working Biharis and Purvanchalis back home every November, trains to Bihar are packed for weeks, and whether a manager will approve leave is a real source of stress for many. (Delhi has even declared a public holiday on 16 November for the festival.)
Of course, it is all in good fun, and nobody is really saying one employee took down Microsoft. The company has said there is no indication of a cyberattack. It first blamed “elevated infrastructure load”, then said servers had become unavailable, and later said it was restoring them gradually while limiting traffic. You can read what actually happened in our report on the Microsoft outage.
What are your views on this explanation? Is this the best excuse for an outage you have heard so far, or has your office come up with a better one?
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Questions to think about
- Why do office memes spread so quickly when a tech service goes down?
- Should employers be more flexible about leave during festivals like Chhath?
- What is the funniest excuse your workplace has used for a system going down?
