These days laughter seems to be the best medicine for the Bollywood box office. Comedy, considered a jumpy genre at the best of times, seems to have found new favour after the success of "Masti".

Suddenly the sombre mood of the last few months, when a series of socially relevant films like "Dev" and "Lakshya" hit the marquee, seems to be ready to lift.

Beginning this week with David Dhawan's "Mujhse Shaadi Karogi", where Akshay Kumar and Salman Khan squabble satirically over Priyanka Chopra, the season of mirth is about to begin.

Dhawan, whose last comedy "Ek Aur Ek Gyarah" was a moderate success, says he has gone in for a different slant in "Mujhse Shaadi Karogi".

Both his leading men have done comedies in the past with Dhawan and say they had a whale of a time doing this film too.

"In fact, I'd like to do one comedy every year," grins Akshay. He's already working on a sequel to one of his most beloved comedies, "Hera Pheri", with director Satish Kaushik.

Salman, who loves his practical jokes and pranks as much as Akshay, has another comedy ready for release. Anees Bazmi's "No Entry" features Salman alongside Anil Kapoor, Fardeen Khan and Bipasha Basu.

Producer Boney Kapoor has so far never produced a comedy - but he hasn't laughed all the way to the back for a long time either. "No Entry" could be just the blithe antidote to his string of flops in recent times.

Bazmi, who directs "No Entry", has another comedy, "Hum Do Hamare Ek", ready for release. This is one of the two pending Govinda comedies, the other being Harmesh Malhotra's "Khullam Khulla Pyar", where he co-stars with Preity Zinta!

Other comedies ready for release include Abbas-Mustan's "Taarzan: The Wonder Car" and Govind Menon's "Kis Kis Ki Kismat", starring Mallika Sherawat.

Then there's debutant director Kabir Sadanand's "total fun film" "Popcorn Khao Mast Ho Jao".

"I just want the audience to have a good time when they come into the theatres," says Sadanand, whose film launches a new leading man called Akshay.

And, while on the road to laughter, let's not forget Prawaal Raman's "Gayab", which opened last fortnight. This comedy about an invisible man, played by Tusshar Kapoor, is the Ram Gopal Varma company's first attempt at comedy since the ill-fated but warm-hearted "Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon".

Varma had hoped to usher back the era of sweet tender comedies that Basu Chatterjee and Hrishikesh Mukherjee specialised in during the late 1970s. The success of two recent comedies - Priyadarshan's "Hungama" and Indra Kumar's "Masti" - has given a new sense of purpose to the comedic genre.

In fact, Raj Kumar Hirani's "Munnabhai M.B.B.S.", which has over the months acquired cult status, clinched the matter as far as comedies in Hindi cinema are concerned.

So far the genre was regarded with caution by the film industry. After an ongoing spate of flop comedies - "Waisa Bhi Hota Hai Part 2", "Nayee Padosan", "Fun2shh" - last year, "Munnabhai..." proved that the audience can take the comic genre seriously when given a decent vehicle. The coming months would prove seriously decisive for comedies in Hindi cinema. If a couple of films among the forthcoming crop of funny movies hit the jackpot, filmmakers might stop taking themselves seriously all the time.

One star raring to let his hair down is Amitabh Bachchan. "After 'Black', I'd love to do an all-out comedy with Sanjay Leela Bhansali," he says.

Maybe it's time the Hindi film industry decided to do justice to a long-neglected genre.