Media Mail – Volume 3 Issue 9
March 1999
Creating our own space, together
With eight issues, Media Mail has completed two years. This is reason enough for us to feel elated. There are reasons to be happy. It is not as if this by itself is any great achievement, but for us it is a triumph of sorts.
Initially we had our share of fear, doubts and anxiety. We had set out with the objective that Media Mail should serve as a platform for all those like-minded friends, colleagues and acquaintances who have been denied the space to voice their ideas and concerns. This was not an impossible dream, but for us it was an uphill task, and entailed a Herculean effort. To begin with, we lacked any prior experience of publishing a newsletter. Besides, we were reeling under severe resource constraints. There was also a nagging doubt in our minds as to how the effort will be received. However, by the time we brought out the third issue, we were more than assured by the tremendous encouragement and support that we received from our readers. The response proved how relevant and necessary a newsletter like Media Mail was in today’s times.
The experience also emphasised that if we seek support from friends, there won’t be any dearth of it. We can sense the strength of support from a small incident. Recently we were talking to a journalist friend and we mentioned to him that Media Mail has over 300 subscribers. He was astounded. In fact, these 300 subscribers are our real strength. Without their contribution and support it would have been impossible for us to sustain the effort, and we are truly indebted to them. It is also interesting that a large number of our subscriptions came from libraries and government institutions.
We had initiated this process for all those friends who do not have any reach in the big commercial newspapers. However, we are noticing that increasingly even well known journalists and columnists are expressing the lack of space for their free views in mainstream media. In one of the Open Forums at the recently concluded IFF1 at Hyderabad, renowned film critics and film journalists were unanimous that there is no space left in mainstream papers for film criticism anymore. The only thing that gets space is film review. In other words, there is no scope for constructive, healthy discussions and debates. This lack of space, therefore is no longer confined to the faceless lot. It is affecting all those who have something different to say, who are battling to resist the pressures of the market.
Meanwhile assaults on freedom of expression continues along with converting information into ‘products’. The past year has seen an unprecedented wave of attacks on artists, journalists, theatre persons, filmmakers and social activists. It is clear today that attacks on media persons and artists are no longer restricted to unknown faces in remote corners of the country. Even Dilip Kumar is no longer safe in his own house.
That creativity is under severe stress from the market forces on the one hand and fundamentalism on the other is clearly evident. And these forces are not keen to allow any space for dissent. What should we do in such a situation? Should we merely bemoan this shrinking space or should we make a positive, concrete effort to fight back? It is surely a time to introspect. We will have to create our own space and this is only possible through collective effort. Maybe we can learn a lesson from the transformations that are taking place in the audio visual media.
When the base for parallel cinema was being eroded by the pressure of commercial cinema, some film makers explored the new domains of the documentary. These film makers started going to remote areas to make issue based documentaries. Not only did these films critically analyse the prevailing inequalities and exploitative nature of the society, they also brought to the fore people’s resistance. These films unfolded new subjects, new symbols, and a new way of story telling. Issue based films have made their own identity and space for themselves. On the one hand festivals, both national and international, are being organized on these films, while on the other, their crucial role in regional struggles and movements have increased their relevance.
But because film making is primarily an individual expression, it was unable to make any perceptible dent in collective intervention. Neither did these films make significant impacts at the policy level, nor were they able to reach the people in large numbers. Yet we can gain from this experience. If we have to change the situation we have to initiate and acknowledge even the smallest of efforts. And in order to keep these alive we have to come together. We will have to create our own space together.
Wagle to sue Shotgun Show
Nikhil Wagle, editor of “Mahanagar” and well known for his crusades against hindutva forces, wants to sue Shatrughan Sinha and Star TV if they refuse to telecast the episode of Shotgun Show featuring Wagle unedited.
Mr. Wagle was featured in an episode on the recent attacks on Christians. During the shooting Mr. Wagle was interrupted several times by Shatrughan Sinha and was not allowed to express his true position on the issue. In a fit of rage Wagle walked out of the show after 25 minutes of the shooting. Later Wagle demanded that Star TV telecasts this episode unedited.
Mr. Wagle said, “I want the entire nation to see for themselves as to why I was so agitated. The problem started when I started attacking the basic policy of the VHP. I said that the VHP had never considered tribals as Hindus, and that is why Christian missionaries had to go to their help.”
Mr. Wagle added, “I explained that if my son was on the verge of death and at that stage a Christian missionary gave me medicines, my opinion then was bound to change. Conversions cannot be done by force. Suddenly Mr. Sinha said that was not our subject.”
According to Shatrughan Sinha, Mr. Wagle was going off-track. Sinha felt that Wagle was “too much in love with his own voice and does not want others to be given a fair chance to voice their opinion.”
Nikhil Wagle feels that Star TV should stop this show since it is being done by a BJP Parliamentarian who is trying to propagate VHP policies.
Source: Asian Age
Play on Tukaram Stopped
The wrath of the Shiv Sena and its allies on cultural expressions continues unabated. This time it was directed towards “Tukaram Abhang Abhang”, a Marathi play on the 17th Century poet, social reformer and saint, Sant Tukaram, that was written on the occassion of his 350th death anniversary.
Sant Tukaram was from a backward caste and is extremely popular both as a poet and a saint. The play, written by Vishnu Wag, breaks the popular myth that Tukaram never died but his body and spirit unified with that of Lord Vishnu’s. Wag’s play is based on the newer findings of historians H. S. Shalunka’s “Virodhi Tukaram” and Dilip Chitre’s “Tukaram,” according to which a Brahman priest, Mhambaji, had actually murdered the poet-saint. Also, the character of Mhambaji, it is alleged, is a caricature of the Sena chief. This the Shiv Sena had serious objections to. Even the RSS had reservations about the controversial end.
The play became very popular in the region, but it first attracted attention when it was being staged in Goa a few months ago in the preliminary rounds of the Maharashtra Rajya Natya Spardha, a state level drama competition. However, since Goa does not have a censoring authority, the play ran without any trouble.
Then the play entered the finals of the competition and the finals were being staged in Maharashtra. In the last minute the Maharashtra Government stepped in through its Stage Performances Scrutiny Board and directed the producers to acquire a no-objection from the board, without which the play cannot be staged. Since it was too late for the producers to obtain the certificate within the dates stipulated for the finals, the play had to be put off. Now the fate of the play hangs on the Stage Performances Scrutiny Board.
From an angry reader
Regarding Media Mail December 1998, some of us were not amused to read your exhortation in “IFA Invites Proposals.” The IFA, according to itself, is an organization which is funded by a foreign organisation – the Rockefeller Foundation – of the US, which actively took part in the Green Revolution and other aspects of imposing the US industries’ artificial chemicalisation of agriculture, leading to the destruction of indigenous ways of life in many parts of the world. How can the IFA be considered independent when it is in the rolls of the Rockefeller Foundation? This type of agriculture has unsettled communities across the US. We do not want to shape our expression in a forced way. After all, subtle swallowing and killing of cultures for commercial ends is to be guarded against.
Systems For Human Welfare, Natural Wild Commons and their Resurrection.
Wild Expressions, 299 Tardeo Road, Nana Chowk, Mumbai 400007
Journalists arrested in Assam
On the 15th of February, hundreds of journalists were arrested in Guwahati when they wanted to take out a procession to the Raj Bhavan for submitting a memorandum to the Assam Governor. They were protesting against the increasing police offensives against journalists in Assam. The Journalists Action Committee was agitating against the arrest of four journalists, including Naresh Kalita, news editor of Danik Agadoot, a Guwahati based language daily. Two others were arrested in Nalbari. Earlier, condemning the police action, veteran journalist and editor of the weekly Natun Shomoy , Ajit Bhuyan said that it was a systematic design of the state government to mount pressure over the media. He accused the CM Prafulla Mahanta for misusing the official machinery against the media.
Courtesy, Asian Age
Children Beware! Shaktiman can take your life!
Two boys in Salem doused themselves with kerosene and set themselves on fire in the fond hope that Shaktiman will come to rescue them. The children died of severe burns in the hospital. One of the victims resisted treatment saying that Shaktiman will save him.
No, this is not about America or Europe. These boys were not influenced by Superman or Ninja Turtles.
The incident is very much our own, our own children, our own culture and a television hero of our own creation. For several months now the TV serial Shaktiman has been doing its rounds on the national network of Doordarshan- again, our very own TV channel. Moulded on the lines of Superman, He Man, Batman (and the rest) with flavours of Indian mythical tales, Shaktiman is normally a comical character who has powers -much like Superman (and perhaps all the rest) – to transform himself into an invincible hero in his crusade against ‘baddies’. He can fly, he can hypnotise, he can shoot baddies with Star War-like laser emissions, he can defeat the worst of the baddies. Any child in trouble can just think of Shaktiman and he is there to save him or her from the worst of dangers.
The serial is produced by the Bhishma Pitamah of Mahabharat, Mukesh Khanna, and is sponsored by Parle, a food product giant. Khanna himself acts as Shaktiman. In every episode Shaktiman appears on the screen to drop a few pearls of wisdom to children on proper values and practices of life.
The serial has become immensely popular among children, and more so among that socio-economic group who do not yet get to see any other channel than Doordarshan. The popularity can be gauged from the fact that children compete with each other in collecting stickers, labels and posters on Shaktiman. What is of concern is that these children are among the younger ones, between six to twelve years old. This is an age when children develop their imagination and tend to emulate elders or those they are attracted to. Logic and questioning come a little later. So it is not unreasonable to expect people who work with, or produce material for children of this age group to be more sensitive and responsible towards what they do.
However, neither the producers of this serial nor the broadcasters, Doordarshan, seem to be much concerned even though the Salem incident is not the first. There have been repeated reports on the Press about children doing dangerous things to themselves influenced by the serial Shaktiman. The Press has also carried concerns of parents who are demanding that Doordarshan should stop telecasting Shaktiman.
Various newspapers, particularly the Hindi dailies, carried a number of letters from concerned parents raising fundamental questions about the responsibility of a medium like television. Lalit Aggarwal from Calcutta wrote, “Due to a dearth of children’s programmes on the TV, a serial like Shaktiman has become immensely popular among children. Children are not only collecting his photographs but have started emulating him. Some time back an eleven year old girl jumped from the third floor confident that Shaktiman will come to save her. Her faith on Shaktiman took her life. In another incident, a boy, in an attempt to emulate Shaktiman’s heroics, made an arrow out of a metal rod and shot his ten year old brother in the eye. Elsewhere, a girl poured kerosene over her body and and set herself on fire hoping that Shaktiman will come to her rescue. But that never happened. The serial has made children to believe that Shaktiman will come to their rescue when they are in trouble. This faith takes all reasoning out of them.”
In another letter, Kusum Lata from Gurgaon wrote,” In every episode the hero of the serial, Mukesh Khanna, makes a farcical show of being a children’s messiah. Many children have ended their lives because of this drama. But he does not seem to care. In every episode he comes on and lectures to children on ethics. One wonders what ethical values he possesses. If he did, he would have had the decency to condole the death of all the children who died because of him. Doordarshan should immediately stop airing such serials.”
Another letter, from Vibhakar Pandya of New Delhi says, “It is the misfortune of Doordarshan viewers that they have to put up with a serial like Shaktiman because they have no other choice. Who knows how many innocent, tender and gullible lives it has taken of its young viewers, who, in the blind faith that Shaktiman will come to their rescue, have ended their lives. Even a country like America had taken some action against characters like Superman.”
Sanjay Bansal from Meerut provides a different view of the issue. He writes, “..Some people strongly feel that the hero Mukesh Khanna’s affiliations with the BJP and his strong political connections have enabled this serial to be aired on DD’s National Network and saved it from being discontinued.”
Mukesh Khanna is not at all convinced about the incidents. In a recent interview to Outlook, Khanna said, “burning oneself is a very adult thing, a kid will never do it.” He said that he does his bit in responsibility by his messages to kids at the end of every episode. As far as the incidents go, he had appointed the Globe Detective Agency to probe these facts. They have found ‘some’ reports to be false. Mukesh Khanna feels there is a conspiracy against Shaktiman. He has three suspects who he does not want to name.
“Within the first 15 episodes Shaktiman became the first Indian super hero. I get 50,000 letters every week. There are bound to be people unhappy with such success,” he told Outlook.
As far as the responsibility of a national, public access channel as Doordarshan goes, it is unclear at the moment. Some reports say DD has increased the number of episodes from 55 to 104, while some say they have decided to discontinue Shaktiman.
Mukesh Khanna has meanwhile filed a whopping Rs. 20 lakh suit against the UNI for propagating false reports about the serial. In response the UNI has apologised to the court.
But the issue is still unresolved. On one hand is the hunger of the industry and producers to make profits even at the cost of children’s lives. On the other is the muffled voice of terrified, concerned parents. The question is, how can these be more audible? Secondly, how can public control be established on the entertainment industry? Both these concerns are reflected on this letter to ‘Hindustan’ by a reader – “… I read in the papers recently that the makers of such serials never force their audience to see their programmes, that it is the duty of parents to ascertain what children should or should not watch on the TV. Can they, by saying such things, shrug their own responsibility from the issue? Serials like Shaktiman only give rise to blind faith among children and affects their mental growth. There are a number of serials on DD that are capable of hypnotising children into believing and emulating the heroes to an extent that can take their lives. All such serials must be banned.”
Murder attempt on theatre activists in Andhra
On the 21st of February 1999 noted theatre activist Purna Chandra Rao and his colleague Ms. Santhi Priya narrowly survived a murder attempt.
Rao, who heads the Hyderabad based theatre group Ethnic Arts Centre, has been involved in a theatre campaign with tribal groups. The campaign aims to prepare six plays with different tribal groups in order to launch parallel campaigns in tribal areas. Finally all the plays are to be staged in Hyderabad.
Since the past two months Puma Chandra Rao’s team along with activists of the Girijana Prajala Sangham based themselves in a remote village Chetti, in the Chinthur forest region of the Khammam district, Andhra Pradesh, and were working on the first play in ‘Koi’, a tribal language.
The play intended to propagate the recommendations of the Bhuria Committee to strengthen the democratic institutions of tribal communities, like their Kula Panchayats and Grama Sabhas. The play highlights the increasing usurpation of tribal lands by non-tribal agriculturalists a nd industries and the destruction of tribal culture, institutions and lifestyle, needless to say the impacts of these onslaughts on women.
Even before this play was completed, the non-tribal lobby started threatening the group to stop the play and the campaign. After a series of abuses and warnings, on 21st of February they reportedly attempted to murder Rao and his colleague Santhi Priya. They were saved by the tribal people who stood around them like wall. Although complaints were lodged with the Collector and SP of Khammam who promised protection to the group for completion of the play and the campaign, but Rao and all the groups involved in the campaign are seeking support and solidarity from activists all across the country.
On Rushdie’s proposed visit to India
It is quite plausible, in fact highly probable, that the granting of 5-year visa, at the present juncture, to Salman Rushdie, the famous and yet controversial author of ‘Midnight’s Children’, ‘Satanic Verses’, ‘The Moor’s Last Sigh’ and many more, by the BJP-led government of India is only a part of their mischievous agenda to provoke Indian Muslims, or rather the lunatic fringe, and thereby paint the whole community as one undifferentiated mass of bigots and fanatics. This they hope, would in turn not only further crystallise and reinforce the ‘Hindu’ identity, they are out to build, but also deflect national and international attention from and significantly downplay the horrific crimes being perpetrated by the Hindutva brigade.
That is why the vicious outbursts of the Naib Imam of Delhi Jama Masjid, Syed Ahmed Bukhari – a self-proclaimed community leader with doubtful following, against the proposed visit of Rushdie to India is all the more deplorable and nauseating. The support extended to him by the Delhi Shiv Sena leader only goes to show how the fanatics of all hues speak the same language of violence and intolerance.
Our commitment to secular, pluralist and democratic values impels us to unequivocally uphold Rushdie’s right to visit India unhindered and to call upon all fellow Indians to frustrate the nefarious design of the Hindutva brigade by treating the calls of Syed Ahmed Bukhari and Jai Bhagwan Goyal with the contempt that they deserve.
Dr. Vivek Monteiro, Ammu Abraham, Irfan Engineer, Dr. Uday Mehta, Jayant Diwan,
Jatin Desai, P.R. Ram, Alfio Miranda, Steve Rocha, Shukla Sen
The Prakriti’98 Festival at Pune
Ananya Chatterjee
There were seven hundred pigs in all. Cleaned, spruced up and ready for the battle. A hundred smartly dressed soldiers came in to the frame and stuffed them one at a time into plastic bags and zipped them up. Then they flew away to a safer shelter. For the pigs it was time to taste the effects of radiation. They were nobody’s enemy but a convenient testometer for the most powerful nation in the world. Their survival or otherwise after the nuclear explosion conducted in the field next door would help the scientists decide whether the bomb that had been created for millions of dollars was lethal enough.
There were around five hundred people in all sitting in the auditorium. Every one of them squirmed in their seats as the pigs shrieked in pain as the bomb exploded. At the end of the screening they thanked their lucky stars that they were not one of them. After all it was just a film!
The Dark Circle’, an 82 minute Canadian production by Chris Beaver, Judy Irving and Ruth Landy is a brilliantly made documentary on the negative impact of nuclear testing on the environment and all living beings, and was just one of the films at Prakriti’98 that left people disturbed and provoked into some serious thinking. The festival itself was a reassurance of the fact that there are still enough filmmakers left who have chosen to make committed, responsible and socially relevant films rather than be usurped by popular culture. And they were more than rewarded by a highly appreciative audience who warmed the venue with their enthusiastic response to every film. But what was more reassuring was the fact that the organizers had chosen to hold this kind of a festival.
What is the objective of education? If you ask any millennium youth he/she will probably say, “to prepare an individual to be economically independent, and thereby empowerment.” But is that the only goal of education? To open up avenues of income generation? Or is there a more intangible, a somewhat more romantic view of education as well?
It was toying with the idea of taking education beyond the class room, quite literally so, that CEC, the parent body for UGC, organised this three day festival of films on human rights, environment and development in Pune recently. Held in the Pune University campus, it was inaugurated by Shyam Benegal. Apart from screening some extremely important and well made films, the festival threw up a lively debate on the penultimate day on what is the objective of education. And the films screened to a largely student audience showcased in Benegal’s words issues concerning 70% of the people of this country, and the stuff that mainstream television and media selectively ignore.
Prakriti’98 was unique in that it is the first and presently the only one in India promoting exclusively films on development. The first Prakriti was held in ’97 at Hyderabad, and the success and enthusiasm that the festival managed to generate induced the organisers to take it up as an annual festival. And the aim of the festival is to increase awareness level amongst people with the help of these screenings. Or, in Choudhury’s words, “to give a larger scope and meaning to the word education.”
The films were definitely meaningful and educative. But there were some which went much beyond being just important issues. Films like ‘Baba Amte’ by Nandan Kudhiyadi, ‘A Season Outside’ by Amar Kanwar, ‘YCP 1997′ by Anjali Monteiro and K.P. Jayashankar stand out as brilliant films apart from the importance of the issues they highlight.
If the aim of education is to enlighten, the objective of prisons is to reform. Or so the books tell us. But we all know this is not what it is like. Anjali and Jayashankar’s film however throws up the amazing accounts of six people who while serving life terms in the Yerwada Central Prison opened up from within. In the confines of the overbearing walls of the prison they turned into poets and artistes. While they share their agony and pain of incarceration with their creativity, the film throws up important questions on socially constructed divides between “us” and “them.” The point of the film is beautifully summed up in the words of one of the prisoners, “there is a larger prison existing outside this one”.
If YCP 1997 moves one to the point of being choked, Baba Amte charms and outwits all the forces around him, including the audience. A part of the ‘Pathfinders’ series, it upholds, through the vision of Baba Amte, the importance of living with dignity as opposed to charity. A sudden encounter with a dying diseased man made Baba Amte give up everything and spend the rest of his life with those afflicted with leprosy and help them lead a life of dignity. Fiercely opposed to charity, he sums up the focal point of the film with one statement, “each one of these inmates work for a living. This gives them confidence. And confidence is more contagious than any disease.” It is while watching this film that one realises the importance of self-worth in building character, whether it is in an individual or in a nation.
‘Sankranti’ by Shyam Benegal, which was the inaugural film of the festival, gave an inspiring account of how an ex-army man from Rajasthan won a monumental battle against official corruption with the help of the ‘Right to information’ bill. There were other films on human rights as well, some which shocked and stunned the audience with their force and directness; like Stalin’s ‘Lesser Humans’. An hour long film on the scavenger community of Gujarat it depicts in stark reality the shocking conditions under which they work and survive, and how social forces allow them no space to have a better life. The other film which kept the audience spellbound by its sheer honesty and simplicity of presentation was ‘Of Hosts And Hostages’ by Gargi Sen, Ranjan De and Sujit Ghosh. The film shows how Goa has been virtually colonised once again, this time by big corporate houses, in the name of developing tourism. The plight of the indigenous people and tourist operators of Goa is revealed with great clarity.
There were other interesting films like ‘Give us back our childhood’ by Urmila Mohite which is a brilliantly made film on street children. It depicts the vacuum in their life while allowing them to retain their dignity as individuals. The filmmaker takes great care to ensure that the subjects are not trivialised or belittled.
Samina Mishra’s Adha Asman highlights healthcare problems of rural women, most of whom fail to get access to it in times of crucial need. Despite the Indian Government’s declaration of ‘Health for all by 2007’, health acre for women in India continue to be seen in the limited light of pregnancy and motherhood. The film reveals how traditional attitudes deny women their share of health care. Ranjan Palit’s camera gave the film a visual edge that many other documentaries lacked.
There were other filmmakers who presented their work at the forum, whose work concentrate more on activism than on the actual crafting of the film. Films like ‘Sehjo Singh’s ‘Kol Tales’, Anand Patwardhan’s ‘Fishing in the sea of greed’, Sriprakash’s ‘Kis ki raksha’, ‘Ajay Bharadwaj’s ‘Ek Minute ka Maun’, were all what is widely known as activists films. The importance of the issues and the involvement of the film-makers to these issues overpowered and overwhelmed everything else. Indeed, some of these cases, any attempt at craftsmanship may have seemed frivolous to the overall style of films. Such issues are normally shunned by funders and committed filmmakers often find it difficult to find funds to complete such projects. But this festival seems to have thrown up an opportunity for the audience to show their appreciation in more ways than one. During the discussion after Bharadwaj’s film, when he confessed that he has not yet been able to pay the edit bill, one gentleman had the magnanimity to hand him over a cheque of Rs 10,000 to clear up his dues.
The only feature film to be screened at the festival was “Zindagi Zindabad’ by Sumitra Bhave and Sunil Sukthankar. A well made film on the problem of AIDS, it attempts to explore an Indian perspective to the problems. The Indian perspective to the problem. The film stars Om Puri, Meeta Vashishta, Milind Gunaji and Uttara Baokar.
Prakriti, its organisers tell us, will be organised every year. And a resolution was taken that these films have to be shown on Doordarshan on primetime. The next venue is likely to be Ahmedabad. Perhaps taking a cue from them, the Trivandrum festival this year has human rights as its main theme, and environment as its theme for documentaries. Heartening for sure, without official encouragement and patronage meaningful documentaries may not survive too long. And if anybody has doubts about the ‘market’ for such work, the packed auditorium at Pune should leave no one in any doubt about a ready audience for such ‘products.’
The New Delhi Video Festival
The first New Delhi Video Festival was held between March 5 to 7,1999 at the St.Columbus School auditorium in Delhi. Organised by NISCORTS, a communication research and training institute, the festival screened about thirty issue based films, most of which were documentaries. Being a competitive festival, several of these films were in the competition section. The jury, headed by noted filmmaker K.Bikram Singh, selected the prize winning films in two categories –over 40 minutes and under 40 minutes.
“Fish Tales”, by Ritu Sarin and Tensing Sonam was adjudged the best film for the “under 40 minutes’ category. “Fish Tales” is a film on sustainable development and environmental issues based on the experiences of traditional fishery in Kerala. The second prize in this category went to “Growing Up” by Venu Arora and N.Ramakrishnan. “Growing up” is a series of films on sexual and reproductive issues for school going children.
“Lesser Humans” by Stalin.K was awarded the best film for the ‘over 40 minutes’ category. The second prize for this category went to “A Journey Together” by Gargi Sen and Ranjan De.
Some of the prominent films in the festival were “YCP”(Anjali Monteiro and K. P. Jayashankar), “In the Eye of the Fish” (Monica Narula. Suddhabrata Sengupta & Jeebesh Bagchi), “Skin Deep” (Reena Mohan), “Aids Lies and Documentaries”(Ananya Chatterjee), “Fishing in a Sea of Greed”(Anand Patwardhan), “When Women Unite”(Shabnam Virmani) and “A Dream of Hanif”(Supriyo Sen & Jayanta Chakravarty), among others.
However, which of these films were entered for competition was kept ‘secret’ by the festival organisers. While the festival could have been an interesting event, it was severely handicapped by the lack of audience. According to NISCORTS, the festival could not be publicised due to objections raised by the I & B ministry, since most of the films entered did not have censor certificates. It is sad that the last minute intervention by the I & B killed a unique alternate effort. It is a genuine loss for viewers who do not get to see such an array of films apart from festivals like this.
Although NISCORTS aimed to keep the festival small and informal, it seemed to have suffered from several organisational lapses. The screenings were marred by sub-standard audio. Some of the films were stopped before the credits appeared and names of films and filmmakers were wrongly announced. Anand Patwardhan’s film was announced (and printed in the brochure) as “Fishing in a Sea of Grief”, instead of ‘Greed’. While there were very few filmmakers attending the festival, some did come all the way from other parts of the country, needless to say with their own money for travel and accommodation. Many of them expressed that they were far from happy with the reception of the organisers. There were also some grey areas regarding selection of films for competition.
While one congratulates NISCORTS for organising a festival of this nature, these are some areas that need serious thinking and working upon. We must acknowledge the fact that spaces are shrinking rapidly. Hence it is important to make the best of whatever little is available to us. One would definitely like to witness a bigger and better organised NDVF in the future.
Bas re Bus!
Ram Pyare
Ram Ram! I’m just returned from the Ram Mela, nee the BJP anniversary bash at Hauz Khas village. No, not quite though. I was not quite at the venue, not having a pass, having just recently lost my job from a prestigious television channel (recession and all that I am told). So I was at the next best possible location, which is next to a TV set. Doordarshan no less was transmitting live the mela (costing one and a half crore, no less I am told) which saw the transformation of the chariot into the bus. No, it was not a magician who did the trick, I must clarify. It was the natural process of being in political office for one year that made this extraordinary transformation take place. Chariot into bus. Nothing out of the normal, my friends tell me. People change parties, colours, bedfellows in one year. In one week fat people grow thin and in fifteen days fair and lovely makes dark women glow. So one year is a long time. Jet age and all that. On top of that, Ram Kripa, I say. Anything is possible. But this evening was most extraordinary. For not only did they forget to show the chariot before it turned into a bus, but it also forgot to mention so many things from history, that I was quite confused by the end of it all. But first things first. I must explain how I came to watch the show in the first place.
It was the fifth month that I had failed to pay my rent, by god, and I was on my way to visit my landlord with a trembling heart. I had only managed to scrape up two months of rent and had no clue how he would react to it. But Ramkripa, my pious landlord and his family were all assembled around the TV set watching the magic of the BJP’s one year yatra which started with the chariot and Ramkasam, ended with the bus. He was a shudh “BJP”, who believed in everything that the saffron brigade had to say. There were two occasions when I had seen him happy and sad. One was when BJP came to power for thirteen days, and secondly when Sushma Swaraj as the then I & B minister had started censoring commercials and serials in her personal capacity. And he was sad when the Sushma Swaraj’s voice went unheard and her plea to declare Karva Chauth into a national holiday was ignored. And the second time I had seen him to be upset when Sushma behen lost her battle against a la Dixit. But to move on from the state to the national level, and from the past to the future, here I was sitting with chai and samosa with my landlord’s family, fortunate enough to be there on a day when the great busride show was on, thereby escape the wrath of non-payment.
The show started with the beginning of Indian history which according to the great theatre director Aamir Raza Hasan (a great creator I am told) was the beginning of the history of India itself. From Mahabharat came the Mughals, who we were told, had made Hindustan their janmabhumi, And contributed to its growth. It was the late entrant, the British, we were informed, who were the villains of the piece. “You Christians”, my landlord was fuming in anger and disgust. “Throw them out.” And turning towards me he said, “Yesterday they came as East India Company, today they have returned as missionaries.” “But was it not the Muslims who you were angry with the last time we met?” I mumbled feebly. “Never, they have lived here for centuries, and they have become our brothers. See, that is why Vajpayeeji decided to visit Lahore, no?”
“But what about the chariot?” I said like a fool again. My landlord was becoming angry with me now. “Grow up young man,” he barked at me.
“Why don’t you start living in the present? We have advanced to the busride and Pokhran and you are still stuck with that ancient chariot!” The events on screen had now advanced further, showing in great details how the British used to torture us. There was Bhagat Singh, the militant Hindu freedom fighter who was on trial by the big bad British while the nice Muslim lawyer was crying hoarse trying to defend him. Then his judgement was pronounced pompously by the big bad British judge. There were cries of protest and resentment from everyone in the room. After all wasn’t it Rome which houses the Catholic stronghold? And see what these white kurtawallahs are upto, using a Roman to come back to power! Beat them up, kill them, burn them. (The missionaries they meant), because they were fast converting everyone to Romevaad. I decided not to put myself into any further trouble by making any more comments. After all, security ka sawaal hai. Why should I bother myself who was at stake, Rome or Ram, or even Rahim.
India had by now been made independent. There was great rejoicing in the room. And they showed the Mahatma who was struggling to reach Pakistan on a goodwill visit to stop the riots. He could not undertake the journey, we were informed with great solemnity by the compere (none other than Om Puri of Tamas fame, Ramkasam). But hold our heart. He also informed us with a lot of cheer how another Mahatma fulfilled this dream and this great journey 52 years later. No prizes for guessing who this one was. The stage revolved around to reveal the two gateposts at Wagah and the bus waiting to cross over at one corner. It was a moment packed with emotion. My landlord was close to tears. And Jai ShreeRam, the bus started. But lo and behold, it spluttered and stopped soon after (must be some Roman horse behind this conspiracy, aur kya?). But the Muslim bhai Jaaved Jaffrey was on stage in a split second to save the day for Hindu Muslim bhaichara. He cracked a few jokes about how this is not “Aisi waisi ki bas ki baat.”
There was a sigh of relief on my face. After all this if the bus had brought the stage down, it would be curtains for me as well. Anyway, to enhance the sense of relief further, Silk Route and Junoon came in from either sides of the border with a song on pop bhaichara.
And then it was time for the national anthem. Everyone in the room stood up with great solemnity on their face. The evening had become so bizarre by then that I had decided to follow all their actions. There was a close up of Vajpayeeji who seemed extremely happy with the show. My landlord had by then decided that if the Mahatma was happy, then the show would be considered successful. I had in the meantime decided to stop talking about the chariot anymore. Chariot chale ya bas, what it is to me, Ramkasam! On my way out I paused for a moment and thought of asking him if Kashi-Mathura was still okay with him. But my survival instincts told me not push my luck any further. What if he insists that I must pay up all the money at once Hai Ram!
Pakistan Press under attack
The Pakistan government’s attempt to intimidate the Press continues. On February 2, when Pakistani journalists gathered outside the Parliament to demonstrate for Press freedom, the police beat them up mercilessly. The assembled journalists were demonstrating against a government crackdown on the Jang group of newspapers who own ‘The Jang’, the most popular Urdu newspaper, and the English daily, ‘The News’. Several journalists were savagely beaten up. Shakil Sheikh, chief reporter, and Mariana Baabar, correspondent of The News’, were seriously hurt when the police in a lathi charge beat them with steel tipped batons. “Is da bee oh ha1 karo asee is da kotay do keease,” they shouted (Treat her as we treated her dog). Recently they had poisoned Mariana’s dog. “It was not the physical thrashing that hurt the most, but the rain of abuses that followed each stroke of the batons. It’s impossible to explain the humiliation – these are unseen bruises that you live with for the rest of your life,” wrote Mariana Baabar in Outlook.
It may be recalled that in November last year, the police raided the houses of BBC’s Karachi correspondent and several reporters of local Urdu papers in order to terrorise them. Even before that, raids were conducted at the office of ‘News Line’, an established monthly, and several reporters were arrested. The ‘News Line’ pointed fingers at Sharif’s bungalow near Lahore and alleged that government funds were being diverted to construct the building.
The Jang group invited the government’s wrath when both its papers accused the Sharif government and members of his family of being corrupt. The papers have also been regularly campaigning against the government’s attempts to make the judiciary its puppet. To curb the critical tendency of these papers, the government stamped charges of tax evasion and black marketing of newsprint quota. For some time now the Federal Investigating Agency (FIA) has been repeatedly raiding the offices of both the papers. Recently the government stopped the supply of newsprint to these papers. The government is also allegedly pressurising the Jang owner to sack senior journalists, including the editor Maleeha Lodhi. So the battle is now about freedom of Press.
There were strong protests against this vindictive action of the Sharif government from journalists in India. A large number of journalists took to the streets in Delhi to protest against the threat to freedom of Press in Pakistan and express solidarity. Pakistani scribes based in England also accused the government of throttling the Press. At a demonstration outside the Pakistan High Commission in London, the Pakistani Journalists Association president Zahoor Niazi said, “Sharif is suppressing the Press to dissuade it from publishing what is not liked by it.”
DAWN Prize
The Women’s International News Gathering Service (WINGS) recently released the annual 1-hour Women’s News Roundup of the hottest women’s radio news stories of the year 1998. The round up presented excerpts from an array of inspiring news stories by and about women from many countries.
The DAWN prize (Katherine Davenport Award for Women’s News) for hottest women’s radio news story of the year was awarded to Nafisa Hoodbhoy of Karachi, Pakistan, for her story ‘Women and the Bomb in Pakistan.”
For ordering details, contact
Frieda Warden, wings@igc.apc.org
TV un-Islamic
Seeking to impose the Taliban brand of Islam in Pakistan, the Taliban Tehrik has announced a house-to house search in the tribal areas of the North West Frontier Province, to seize and destroy radios, television sets, drugs and other “un-Islamic” items.
According to the BBC, the Tehrik warned of severe punishment if these “un-Islamic” articles were found in any house.
Film South Asia’99
After a tremendous energy generated by the first Film South Asia festival and the subsequent traveling festivals that went all over the world, Himal is organising the second Film South Asia festival in Kathmandu between September 30 and October 3, 1999. This competitive biennial festival is open to documentary film; on South Asian subjects. Documentaries, both on video and film, made after August 1, 1997 are eligible for entry in the competition category There is no bar on the duration of the films although preference will be given to full-length documentaries The festival also has an information section which can have films made before the cut off date. Like the earlier festival, a selection of the outstanding films from FSA’99 will be taken around and screened all over South Asia and the world.
Deadline for entries: 30 June’99
For entry form and details, contact
Manesh Shresthe, Festival Director
GPO BOX 7257, Katmandu, Nepal
Ph: 477 1 5433W542644. Fax: +977 1 521012
e-mail: fsa@rnos.com.np
Berlin Interfilm
The 15th International Short Film Festival, Berlin will take place between October 26 – 31, 1999.
Interfilm is dedicated to independent, innovative and off beat films and video. This year’s themes, very widely speaking, are related to’ Future’ and ‘Ecstasy’. An international jury will award five prizes. Films and videos in all ‘formats and lengths may be submitted. However, films-of upto 30 minutes and not older than five years only can be entered for competition.
Deadline for entries: July 1, 1999
For information, contact
Interlilm, Urbanstrasse 45, 10967 Berlin, Germany
Ph + Fax-. +49-30-6 9329 5S,
e-mail: intein/mberlin@yahoo.com
Bengali paper in Singapore
A Bengali newspaper, the first in south-east Asia, is expected to hit the streets in Singapore this month, a news report said today. The paper is aimed at the 40-50,000 Bangladeshi workers living in the prosperous city-state, the Straits Times said.
Media guide for Gender Sensitivity
Women’s Media Watch Jamaica (WMW) recently launched a guide to gender sensitivity in the media. “Whose Perspective? A Guide to Gender Sensitive Analysis of the Media” is the result of ten years of hard work.
The guide, designed to assist women and men in understanding how the media promotes and perpetuates certain values, attitudes and notions of what is acceptable behaviour, will be a valuable resource material in WMW’s gender sensitivity training workshops and seminars, which were attended by some five hundred people in 1997.
It is a user friendly guide whose cartoons and participative exercises convey in a concise, interesting way WMW’s message, which is: “Women and men, young and old, at all levels of society come into contact with media messages from all over the globe. Our objective is to develop the public’s capacity to respond analytically to these images and messages.”
The guide is divided into four sections. Part one is devoted to gender images in the media, focusing on the use of stereotypes in advertising, music lyrics and videos, films, soap operas and the news. Part two looks at gender, media and violence against women. The day-to-day impact of the stereotypes used in the media comes under scrutiny here. Parts three and four are of specific practical use. Part three offers useful exercises on how to critique the media, using monitoring etc., while part four sets out step by step guidelines on how to conduct your own workshop.
For details, contact:
Women’s Media Watch Jamaica,
PO Box 344, Stony Hill, Kingston 9, Jamaica.
e-mail: wmw/am@cwiarnaica.com
(Courtesy, WACC-Action)
IAWRT Awards for radio & television
The International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT) awarded eight radio and television programmes on ‘Women and- Human Rights’ produced by women from all over the world. The awards were announced on February 19 at the conclusion of the 28th IAWRT conference in Delhi. The theme of the conference was ‘Cultural Diversity: A media Challenge’.
The Jury for radio programmes, comprising of Nirmala Aggarwala (India), Musi Khumalo (Zimbabwe) and Oona Solber (Norway), heard 27 radio programmes and selected ABC Australia’s “Shifting Sands – The Last Voice of an Ancient Tongue” by Shared Davis as the best programme. This programme is the story of a dying language from the experience of a woman. Three other programmes that received honourable mentions were All India Radio’s Kannada programme “Oh God, Once Be a Woman” by Maitreyee Jagirdhar on a story of women’s empowerment, “The Challenge” by Florence Bombana, Radio Uganda on legal rights of women and widows and “Candy Microphone” by Yasemin Sokmono of TRT Radio, Turkey, on the status of women today.
The Jury team for television programmes, comprising of Mal Johnson (USA), Ingrid Gavshon (South Africa) and Rinki Roy Bhattacharya (India), selected the best from 48 television programmes, including 12 from India. The top award for television programmes went to “Cruel Ritual” by Ariana Bukovic on an African ritual of circumcising young girls. “Cruel Ritual” was made for ZDF TV, Germany.
Gargi Sen’s “Imagine Kalpana,” a documentary produced for Doordarshan, received an honourable mention. “Imagine Kalpana” is a film on the experiences of Kaplana Dutta, an eminent revolutionary who chose the path of armed struggle against the British in the early thirties. “Slavery in France” by Dominique Torres about women from third world countries smuggled to France to be used as slaves, and “Hope Remains” by WDR TV, Germany, about the life of women in the Taliban ruled Afganistan, also received honourable mentions.
Golden Gate award for Amar Kanwar
Amar Kanwar’s award winning documentary “A Season Outside” was awarded the Golden Spire Trophy in the Golden Gate Awards Competition at the San Francisco International Film Festival for 1999.
The Golden Gate Awards are part of the San Francisco Film Festival which is one of the oldest festivals in the west. In 1999,1600 films were entered from 60 countries for 27 awards. ‘A Season Outside” received the Golden Gate Award in the catagory of Television/Current Events. The jury’s statement said, “we choose this documentary for its meditative reflection and beautifully crafted cinematography that creates a compelling and hypnotic film about choosing a path towards tolerance.” The festival now takes place between 22 April to 6 May when the award winning films will be shown along with a selection of feature films and retros. Earlier the film also received the Golden Conch at the MIFF’98 and was awarded the best programme, script, camera and sound at the All India CEC UGC Film Festival, 1998. The documentary was also seleceted by a number of prestigious film festivals world wide including the Oberhausen in 1998.
Seminar on Journalism
The Institute for Further Education of Journalist, FOJO, in Kalmar, Sweden, is organising an international seminar on Women on Journalism. The seminar will be held in Kalmar from September 27 to October 15, 1999. Sida covers all expenses for participation, international travelling, accomodation in Sweden and meals for the participants. The seminar admits 20 participants and invites women journalists with extensive journalistic experience. Participants should have command in English. About 32 countries are invited for this seminar. The closing date for application is June 4, 1999 and the application form must be send directly to Fojo.
For details contact Christina Winso, International
Secretary, Ph: 46 480 44 64 00, Telefax: 46 480 44
64 20, e-mail: christina. winso@fo.hik.se
Impact of Hindi Masala Movies on caste, class and gender relations in the North Indian context
Dr. Surendra Nischal
Cinema as mass media is endowed with unlimited potentials. It can be used as an ideological apparatus to re-interpret existing social and political realities. But despite being an extremely potent medium of change has cinema been able to produce a class of social critic? Has it altered established social arrangements any where? What role does cinema play in the lives of common man? The answer to these questions depends largely upon who wields this ideological apparatus, what he depicts, for whom and with what purpose? Accordingly it may be a great liberating as well as conserving force.
It is recognized the world over that women have been subservient to men by ideas and stereotypes as much as by material conditions. Men owned, controlled selective ideals for women. It has acted as a medium for the comodification and sexualization of the female body. Such an understanding culminated at the 4th UN International conference of women held at Beijing in September 1995. In the conference the importance of media in effecting changes in gender relations was underscored. Under para I items 234 to 245 the strategic objective is stated to promote a balanced and non-stereotyped portrayal of women in media.
The present research accords primacy to a phenomenological approach, which maintains that unlike matter man has consciousness. According to Alfred Schmaltz, a man sees, interprets and experiences the world in terms of the meanings in which he actively constructs his own social reality. The social world is not made up of entities which are external to the subjective experience of the members.
We endeavored to study the impact of Hindi Masala Movies from the perspective of the social actors, i.e. how audience views the impacts, what role do they accord to HMM for the felt changes around their social universe. We conducted a survey of 420 respondents from the district of Saharanpur (Western Uttar Pradesh) through structured interviews. The data we generated evolved in various stages through participatory method, and was collected from Saharanpur (an industrial urban center), Sultanpur (a small urban town) and Jattowala (a village). Although the major focus of the study was Saharanpur city the other two places were considered to assess the penetration and impact of cinema on the so called traditionally backward rural social structure.
The Audience
It was largely proved that going to the cinema is a male prerogative. Our respondents included 67% males and 33% females. We interviewed Hindus and Muslims in the same proportion which they represent in the population of Saharanpur, i.e. 59% Hindus, 40% Muslims and 1% others.
This study attempted to focus on four major aspects, namely, frequency to visit the cinema, company and denial of permissions to see a movie, the sources of information and decision making; and finally the attraction of themes depicted in the film.
The data revealed that cinema plays an important role in the lives of 75 % respondents. 27.4 % go to the cinema after a gap of two to three months, while 10.7% enjoyed one to three movies every week i.e. they were cinema addicts. 96% respondents from Jattowala villages were regular visitors to the cinema as against 75%’Sultanpur and Saharanpur. Moreover the number of cinema addicts was the highest (27.3%) at Jattowala and lowest (8.2%) at Saharanpur. This clearly indicates that the cinema is no longer a preserve of urban culture. The proportion of women in the audience at these cinema halls is quite low (10%).
The proportion of women in the audience decreases sharply as we move from the urban to suburban, and further to rural areas. No woman dares to visit a cinema hall alone; or even in the company of female friends. The percentages of Muslim cinegoers was slightly higher than the Hindus and continues to show on upward trend as we move from Saharanpur to Sultanpur to Jattowala.
87.8% women were not allowed to see the film of their own choice. Many girls, particularly unmarried students in Sultanpur and Jattowala, were allowed to see only religious movies or family based stories. There is a virtual ban on “A” movies, horror movies, gangster films, movies with multiple murders, or those that depict women of loose character or women who challenge the system. It is normally the senior male members in the family who exercise a serious and decisive censorship.
The songs were amongst the main attractions in the movies. The story of the film emerged as the most derisive influence (47.6%), the cast was an attraction for 23.33% respondents, while for 5.7% the director of the film was an important consideration.
The audience, we discovered, do not have any specific image of a satisfving film. They just view it without preconceptions, and on the basis of their own rationality, value preferences or aesthetic sense. People are not choosy about the theme, but the picturisation. They like the depiction of songs and dances, characters with total devotion to god, self sacrificing wife and poverty, and disapproved the depiction of excessive violence, nudity, rape, drunken husband, beating wife, non acceptance of’ illegitimate child, extra marital affairs and prostitution, while kissing, hero as a superman, women fighting, children rebelling against parents were not definitely decided. The liking and disliking was greatly influenced by gender and marital status. Other variables like caste, class, occupation and educational level were found to have little influence.
Impact On Caste
77.4% people admitted to castewise identification of the characters. The upper caste and class was more conscious than the backward and scheduled castes.
However half of them were not’ satisfied with the accuracy of the portrayal of their caste. They complained about the superficial distorted, exaggerated, partial, selective and at times politically motivated representation of their caste. The members of lower castes often complained that the finer aspects of higher caste were unduly highlighted, which the members of higher caste registered counter complain stating that often the plights of the scheduled castes were over represented so that they can attract undue social sympathy and hatred for upper castes. Such deceptions often precipitated latent caste tensions as such ten sions occasionally surfaced in reality.
A majority of them felt that cinema exposes them to the glamorous as- pects of upper castes, culture resulting into the development of the feeling of superiority among the upper and relative deprivation among the backward and scheduled castes.
This can be referred to as Sanskritisation or the.’ process through which one local section of a caste imitate the ways of life samskaras and the performance of rituals of another local sections. By focusing on the observation of rituals HMM are acting as a great facilitated for Sanskritisation. The study also reveals that people are imitating finer and glamorous aspects of the life style and culture as presented in movies. While initiating a conscious princess of Sanskritisation HMM was a1so disseminating a secularized code of life thus filtering down and universalising selective aspects of great traditions of Indian culture.
Manners of worship are rapidly changing in this region arid 42% give the credit for such changes to Hindi morales. The impart of cinema was applauded by 61 .41% respondents in the celebrations of ceremonies related to marriages. However the rites related to funeral are not being initiatied from cinema or from other castes.
HMM seemed to have a definite impact tm weakening the rigidity of the caste system. 63.3 % respondents admitted that their friends or relatives have flouted them. 76.7 % respondents affirmed increase in the inter caste marriages due to the Impact of HMM.
Impact on Class
People identify the class of the characters of the movies from the depicted standards of their lives. Cinema influences the priorities of spending but is incapable of changing their income. Therefore the only alternative left with the masses is to emulate the personality characteristics of the rich and the poor.
The people were found to perceive the characteristics of the rich as tractor selfish careless criminal chest while the traits such as kind hearted honest, traditional hard working, endowed with religious tendencies and love for children were found associated with the poor. Hindi masala movies quite often depicts and contrasts the lives of the rich and the poor in minute details. It allows the poor audience to peep into the comforts and luxuries of the rich. 71 .2% people compared their lives with the poor characters of the movies. Those who compared themselves with the rich admitted that they felt greedy and wanted to be rich. 40% of them admitted that such comparisons have lasting impact on them and such a mental state got reinforcement an each successive movie. This seems an alarming situation as it amplified the focal role of HMM raising expectations where as the prevailing economic opportunities do nut allow (far such expectations to be fulfilled. It is commonly believed that this situation leads the individuals to frustrations and induces the youth in criminal activities.
HMM seems to have raised the self esteem of the poor. Beginning to feel they can also be rich they have learnt to make collective efforts and make use of governmental institutions in their favour. Thus HMM are producing contradictory effects. It was also found that the selective depiction of poverty in HMM is associated with the presentation of tile virtues of poverty. The pattern of emulation indicated HMM as an ideological apparatus fur keeping the lower classes to passively accept their situation.
Impact on Gender Relations
HMM also seemed to have been successful in bringing the boys and girls of specific’ age close to each other. It has attacked not only on the restrictions imposed upon the spheres of interaction but also on social intercourse of its members An overwhelming majority (97%) felt that cinema has helped them develop friendship with the opposite sex However, they feel the social space is not permitting it. This is more true of rural areas.
The viewers at Saharanpur liked the portrayal of women as ideal lover wife and mother. Where as viewers in Sultanpur and Jattowala liked the depiction of strong and brave women. 62.3% male and 32.4% female respondents confessed they or their friends indulge in teasing, chasing, flirting, trapping girls to get to know her. 30% respondents believe that Hindi movies motivate such behaviours and society accommodates such behavior. It was also found that daughters indulging in such activities are subjected to more checks and parents quite often withdrew their daughters from schooling.
63% youths felt they’re being lured by movies into love affairs. In HMM man-women relations based on the strength of affections are rarely depicted. 91.2% respondents felt Hindi movies encouraged premarital sex which often resulted in pregnancy. 61% respondents personally knew such persons. The study discovered that society is developing its own mechanism to protect its members from and urging in pre-marital relations. Two important practices that are being practiced are (a) stricter control over the girls and (b) lowering the age of marriage. Another consequence of the depiction of pre-marital relations 85.2% respondents perceive, has led to the rise of crime against women.
HMM has some liberating impacts pacts for women also as 63.3% respondents felt that as an impact of cinema. Women have begun to express their sexual desires leading to change in their sexual behavior. This was realized by 71.2% men whereas only 48.2% women agreed to it. Even extra-marital relations are reported to be on rise. The plots of HMM provide justifications and temptations for Indulging in extra marital affairs.
32.6% respondents feel that a woman can only be happy under the protection of her husband. It implies women’s dependence on men and reinforces insecurities among women.
HMM depicts violence in its various manifestations. Those who inflict such violence are being glamorized in HMM. Some forms of violence are rampant in real life and all the available evidences suggest gender violence is fast becoming a feature of dai1y living in contemporary India. Sexual abuse beating and intimidation in homes are the most endemic and wide spread forms of violence m north India. In our study 67% respondents in formed that they knew women beaten up by their husbands or in-laws and unmarried girls by their fathers and brothers and other relatives.
82% respondents attributed this practice to be copied from HMM. Whereas 46% respondents reported that the movies suggest to women not to react to such violence.
This study was Initiated by Reil Turksma,
supported by the Royal Netherlands Embassy, New Delhi, and conducted at Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh.
An Interview with Ali Kazimi
The Narmada movement inspired many film makers to document the movement and spread its message aII over the world, but there -as one that moved and inspired everyone – from mainstream television viewers to broadcasters, film festival juries to grassplot groups the world oven The film was ‘Narmada: A Valley Rises’, and the maker Ali Kazimi.
AIi grew up in Delhi. At fourteen he took up photography. While at St.Stephens College doing his BS% Ali became intensely involved with documentary photogtaphy. He also began to produce radio documentaries.
Subsequently Ali got interested in documentary films. To learn about filmmaking he joined the Indian Institute of Mass Communications and Jamia in its initial days. Later on an exchange programme he went to the York University in Canada.
Ali is now settled in Canada. He is a well – known cinematographer apart from being a documentary film maker with a large number of awards and honourable mentions against his name. be spoke to Ali when he was in Delhi recently.
What initiated you to documentary films?
I guess there have been a number of factors in that. Certainly Anand’s films were an influence because I saw many of them before I went to Canada. There were also a number of film makers in Canada who were doling very pointed political work – not so much political work as much as work that was from the heart, work that was passionate, that was engaged rather than from an ‘objective perspective’. That was the kind of film making I was drawn to. What 1 was really surprised by was that, given the long history of the Film Board in Canada, when I went to film school there most film students were not interested documentary. In fact they had an extremely deep disdain for documentary. ‘They either wanted to be Spielbergs or they wanted to make European art cinema. It was the turning point in Canadian cinema because it was a time when Canada stopped being known for its documentaries and started becoming a place for totally personal art feature films.
Isn’t a similar trend visible in documentaries as well? Also there is a growing trend of universalising issues and forms? You don’t seem to fit into this trend. How do you deal with it?
It is very difficult. Even though I have been living in Canada for fifteen years, in many ways my context and my way of story telling comes from being an Indian. My sensibility is shaped by that. But it is also shaped by observing India from outside and how I engage with it constantly. Having said that, I have a very deep suspicion of personal documentaries. There are a number of people whose work, I feel, does become self indulgent and in a way if serves its own purpose. But I am not interested in that. Then there are many film makers like Nick Broomfield, who have made a career out of being the anchor in the film that becomes ‘Nick Broomfield chasing Margaret Thatcher’, ‘Nick Broomfield chasing a madam inside the brothels of Hollywood’ or Nick Broomheld doing something else. For me it is a part of the deep politicization of documentaries, its about documentaries being increasingly driven by market forces. It is about broadcasters controlling documentaries and defining what kind of documentaries trebling made in the name of ratings, in the name of the audience. However, no one ever has explained how they can tell what the audience want.
There is a growing culture of Commissioning Editors in the west particularly. The term ‘Commissioning Editors’ started in England and is now adopted across Europe and North America. Commissioning Editors are the power brokers of broadcasting and particularly in documentaries, they are the gatekeepers of what the audience sees and does not see. These people have tremendous power, can instantly give you a film to make or turn you down flat over and over again for years. The pretext used in all the cases is ‘the audience’ – the audience cannot see this film, we don’t think that this is good enough for the audience. Now this is at the commissioning stage and the commissioning stage is the most important stage because that is where you get the biggest chunk of money. Acquisitions’ is when the broadcasters acquire a film that has already been made. They have no input, they can’t say that this film can’t be made because the audience wont like it. However they have been known to buy the same films that they tackled down as an ‘Acquisition’. There is however a big difference between the two. You might get, lets say $50,000, from them if it’s a Commission but you will only get $8,000 from them if its an Acquisition. Its playing at the same slot for the same audience and in my experience, having closing examined the numbers, the ratings don’t change. So this dubious argument that the audience doesn’t like films that are socially engaged just doesn’t hold water.
When we go to a Commissioning Editor or broadcaster we are made to grovel, we are made to feel as small as they possibly can make us. Its not just me, I know many film makers who have huge track records, who have been making films for 25years who are treated in the same way. It becomes a complete exercise in power rather than an engaged, sensible conversation. They say to you straight at your face, ”we are looking for a block buster piece for this slot and yours doesn’t fit the bil1.” Or if they ask you what the film is going to be about and you say, ”l don’t know, I am going to go off on a march to India for ten days, that’s what they say its going to last, I feel it is important, I feel it has a whole bunch of importance to issues but I cant say what’s going to happen, etc.” you are out. Now, you have to trust me and you have to trust the idea. A11 documentary film making is ultimately a leap of faith, both on behalf of the film maker and also the funders. You just have to inherently, intuitively trust the process. In this climate which is market driven, the bottom line doesn’t want any uncertainty. The bottom line demands certainty, the bottom line demands a kind of ‘product’. In fact people actually use that word. So it is about the corporatisation of the documentary.
In North America companies are forming that are corporations, that will then farm out to independent film makers to make ‘products’, rather than ‘films’. There is a difference in that. The difference between a film maker driven work and a product is that in a product everybody has their hands in the pie and there is a real hierarchy of interference, After the shooting of the film, suddenly the company or the producer that has hired them will start making serious creative inputs in the film. Then to compound it, the broad- casters and the funders will also come into the editing room and demand things. This problem is that all these levels of interference are being increasingly legalized and they are put into the contractual language. You are caught between a rock and a hard place. The only thing that you can do in that case is to work with people you trust or compromise and say that given this scenario this is the best you can do. Unfortunately, it is increasingly becoming very, very difficult for independent film makers to make films about social issues. Increasingly the work that these people want is – the buzzwords are – ‘quirky’ ‘edgy’ or ‘gritty’.
What is quirky?
Say, tile work that is about the so called third world that is profoundly exploitativte. It needs to be exploitative. The ante is being raised in documentary film takingly these so called ‘reality based programmes’. Indian versions of it like ‘lndia’s Most Wanted’ and stuff like that, are really pushing the ante of where the boundary lies in terms of voyeurism and observation. Recently I came across this film which enraged me profoundly called ‘The Selling of innocence’. This a film which has won an Emmy and several other awards all over the world. I was shocked to learn that it was part of the plenary session in the International Conference on Women and Slavery. First of al1 it is a profoundly dishonest film in terms of film making, and the kind of manipulation involved, it is profoundly exploitative. I think the stories of the film itself are strong enough without getting into the kind of exploitative scenarios that the film gets into. At the same time the film continues to play to a sensationalist streak in broadcasting in order to be marketable. It plays to the peanut gallery. The women I feel are doubly exploited. Once they are exploited in the situation they find themselves in and then they are exploited by the very film that purports to tell their story, which is quite disturbing. I use that film only as an example because it was a film that particularly affected me in terms of what it was about and what it went and did. It is that kind of film making which gets funding.
How do you decide on your theme? Why did Narmada attract you?
The reasons are very complex. I trust my instincts, I feel if something pulls at my heart, that’s the most important thing to make the film about. Narmada was a very complicated thing. I knew about the struggle since its very inception partly through my friend Ashish Kothari and partly through NGOS working there, partly through news reports and things everybody had heard about. There was also this very odd connection with Narmada. Every summer when I was a child, I used to go down to Hyderabad to visit my grandmother and my favourite part of the trip was the trip through the Narmada Valley. Then I was particularly frustrated by the portrayal of third world people as sort the perpetual victims waiting for the white man to arrive. I felt that this in itself was a myth that was constantly being perpetuated by everything right across the media.
At that time, in 1989, I was shooting a film here on Tibetan refugees for the National Film Board. Medha had come to Delhi. I met Medha and we had a tremendous discussion. She said, ”l am going to the valley tonight, why don’t you come?” I said ”fine.”
I went there for ten days the first time and was incredibly moved by my experience there. They told me that they were going to have this march in December. That was October. So I was thinking about it. I was in Delhi for just two months then. I went for two of the initial meetings where the march was being discussed. I had no money. But the advantage that I have is that I work as a cinematographer. So I can be a one person crew. I went to Toronto for four days. I had some savings with which I rented the first Hi8 camera that was on the market. I didn’t have money to buy it. I bought forty tapes, bought another ticket and came back in four days. They told me “dus din mein ho jayega”(“come for ten days”). I rented the camera for ten days and I was here for five and a half weeks.
It was important to finish the film properly. I think there are two ways of marginalising a film, one is that you don’t give it adequate funding. This means that the filmmakers have to improvise and somehow scrape together a film. Then you say, “Well, this is not upto broadcast standards.” You have gone through this whole struggle and then you are ticked out again. I wanted to make a film that was upto any kind of broadcast standard. It was also important for me to construct the film in a way that although it happened in a political time, it wasn’t a current affairs piece.
Then how did you manage to broadcast it? Was it because it won many awards?
No, the awards came much later, Actually, the whole process of funding a film is that you have to get a commitment from the broadcaster before you can start your funding cycle. Shooting Indians is a film where I pulled together the budget from the Arts Councils. I finished it within that budget, and then decided to sell it. But for Narmada I decided to go to the other route where I managed to get a commission from a broadcaster. That is called a broadcast licence. Once you have that, then it triggers at various levels of funding. Of course the broadcaster gives you a very little money, but then they are really proud to claim every award that comes along. They put it in their brochures, that this is the film, this is OUR film that they did. They never say that it took the filmmaker three years to get funds inspite of it being THEIR film.
Narmada is very different from your next film, Shooting Indians. Yet there are commonalities. What do you think is common to both the films? And what inspired you to make two very different kinds of films.
You know, one of the dangers of being a filmmaker and having whatever relative success is that the next film that the people want from you, they want exactly the same thing. I don’t think it is only about film making, it’s the same about any creative or artistic work. So I consciously wanted to make a film that was completely different in many ways. For me both are very personal films, films that I believed in to be able to see them for a number of years. Both films I felt were important to put myself in. It was important for me to do that. Both the films also have connections with historical events and history is a big passion. I think it is very important that we don’t forget things. I think both films are about people who refused to be victims. They have gone through the horrors of a kind of depression at different levels of a very personal oppression that affected their lives. But to me they have stirred to move beyond that. They refused to take the victimized position. For me they are the survivors of a tremendous desire to survive. To me that is very important.
How do you define a political film?
I don t know what is a political film. I think there are two types of film making. One is in which the film
maker takes responsibility for what is being said in the film. The other is in which a filmmaker hides behind the frame work of ‘objectivity’. For me, I make films that have my point of view in them. I take the responsibility for what is in them. They are not films that are in any way buying the notion of objectivity, I don’t buy that at all. Another thing that is very important, to be able to state the level of subjectivity. I think even if the people in the audience would disagree with you, at least they a re very clear about where you stand. 1 think that is very important. If somebody knows where you stand then there can be a dialogue. I don’t think that balance is all about showing both sides of history. I tried to get people on both sides in Narmada. But it is clear in the construction of the film where my sympathy lies, what my perspective was, were my access is, who trusts me and who doesn’t.
What do you think of the Indian documentary films?
I think there is a profound tragedy. I have seen some documentaries in a video festival two years ago in
Bombay. I thought they were really really good. I thought there has been a quantum leap. But I think the filmmakers were facing the same problems basic among which is funding. Then, what do you do with the film when it is made? It is heart breaking to see that film makers put such a tremendous amount of work, blood, sweat and tears, and more, into a film, only to be forced to be put in a situation of going from village to village with a video projector and generator to show it to a small, limited audience. I am not denying that there is a need, its important to do that. But to do that at a time when there is a potential to reach the entire country through the satellite broadcasters, I think there is a serious problem.
What is your observation about the Indian satellite scenario?
I think it is the same thing as everywhere else with an Indian flavour to it. Again it is all being driven by the
same forces of ratings. It’s no different. There are people like TVI who are trying to do something different, but are suffering because of it. It is the same kind of market forces that are driving it. You see the Indian version of the same things – game shows, quiz shows, soaps.
What keeps you going as a political film maker?
The only thing I want to say is that sometimes I really despair about being a film maker. Its constantly a turmoil, its constantly a battle, sometimes its extremely wearying, where you feel ”why am I doing this? Who at a1l am I reaching out to?” But then I feel it is very important to realise that work does get out. People make dubs of your film, show it to people and somewhere or the other what keeps me going is when I meet people who say, ”y’know, when I saw that film of yours 1 got involved and this is what it did to me, or when I meet students who say, ”l saw this film of yours and this is the kind of films I want to do, or simply, ”l got more interested in this and so I went and read more about it.” That is very important to me.
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… I think in many ways living in Canada has allowed me two broader perspective. I think for me there is a tumultuous rhythm in my relationships between both the countries. My understanding of one effects the understanding of the other. My understanding of the position of native people in Canada and the Canadian colonial historical perspective allows me to see what is happening in India with a completely different perspective.
Yeah, there absolutely is racism in Canada. I have done whatever I could to fight against it. As you will see in Shooting Indians, Jeff’s entire existence changed because of a profoundly racist experience in the hospital. I gained a 1ot of personal experiences from both Narmada and Shooting Indians where I refused to behave as the victim. Yes there is racism. Yes I have faced it, from the most mundane to the most blatant. One has to fight against it.
I think in the larger context most of the Indians who go to Canada come from middle class backgrounds. In a way they are coming from a position of privilege within the society suddenly to a position that is not so privileged. So the impacts of discrimination become very profound. However, I have seen many of the same people being profoundly discriminatory themselves when they are back in India, y’know, in their interactions with servants, with scooterwalas, with rickshawalas, with shop keepers. In fact if they were in that same position, if the tables had reversed on them in Canada, they would scream bloody murder. But in that observation it no way negates the level of racism in Canada.
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I think in many ways Canada is a big experiment. The demographics are changing profoundly. When I went to Toronto fifteen years ago, Toronto was a very white Anglo- Saxon city. It has now been declared as the most multi-cultural city in the world by the United Nations. Over 50% of the population in Canada is not white. There has been a very strange sense of harmony and balance that’s been achieved. In many ways, it opens up your world view. Like, the editor who cut Shooting Indians, Ricardo Costa, is from Cuba, from the Cuban Film Institute. He brought a very different sensibility and passion and a different style of filmmaking. We had wonderful conversations during the 12 weeks to prepare the film. Many influences like that are culminating in my work.
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One of the things that distance does is that it tends to magnify your fears and anxieties. Sometimes I used to feel a profound sense of isolation. The Indian community in Canada, while being very active in rallying against injustices of racism in the society, tends to be quite right wing in its attitude to the politics in India. None of them feel that this is an inherent contradiction and I find that very odd. They will on the drop of a hat write angry letters to the editor, go marching out to the office of a newspaper which writes supposedly anti-Indian stuff, But when it comes down to actually looking at their role of what is happening in India – and they have a very active role, the VHP for example is very active in Canada – they are very strange. VHP is a very important force which puts up all kinds of cultural activities.
It was ironic that the power of the VHP was driven home to me before everything started in 1988. My partner at that time had a Hindu name, although she was not. So we got this call. I picked up the phone. This guy said he was from the VHP and they were doing a fund raising drive. Usually, I put down these sales calls but I was intrigued that it was the VHP calling. He went on with this long sales pitch to me about how Hinduism was under threat in its motherland. So there was this rallying cry that they wanted money. I was very inquisitive to know more about it. So I discovered that he was calling from Hawaii which was their fund raising centre and had all these toll free 1800 numbers that you can call from anywhere in North America. Then I know friends whose parents are actively involved in sending money here.
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To see the shift in the Indian middle class to the right has been very painful for me whenever I have come back. I remember sitting with a childhood friend of mine for dinner. I was meeting his sister in law for the first time. She is an MA and she ran for a political party and so on. She said to me,
”Okay, your name is Ali?”
I said yes.
”You live in Canada?”
I said yes, wondering where it was all going.
She said, ” When people ask you who you are, what do you say?”
I said, ”why, I say I am an Indian. What else am I going to say?”
She said, ‘really?”
”You seem surprised, why is that?” I said.
She said, ”well, since you are a Muslim living in Canada, I thought you would be proud to call yourself a Pakistani.”
It spoke to me of what were the personal shifts happening and how it was becoming acceptable to say things that would have been unacceptable before. lts a strange thing. I am hassled from time to time when I
come through ‘immigration’. They look at my name and they see it’s a Muslim name and I am hassled in India! I get so angry. Earlier I used to take it very personally. Now I just let it go. And its not just me. There are a lot of Indian taxi drivers over there. One of them is Iqbal Singh. He asked me whether I face problems in India at the immigration. I asked him why he was asking this question. He said that when they see his name lqbal, their level of understanding is so profoundly poor, that they don’t know that its a common name. Then he gets it from the Americans as well, that he’s a Sikh with a name like Iqbal. I think the degree of shift in the spectrum is quite profound both here and there.
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New Films
Fish Tales
30 min, English, 1998
Fish Tales, a film on sustainable development, explores developmental and environmental issues by focussing on traditional fishery in Derala. Thirty years of top-down development policies have failed to address the needs of fisher folk and their special relationship with the sea. Today fishing communities are worse off than before faced with the alarming crisis of declining fish stocks. Fish tales is cautionary, it underlines the need to initiate development policies that are sustainable and beneficial to the communities involved.
Film by: Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Soman
Source: Foundation for Universal Responsibilty,
UGF, Zone 4A, India Habitat Centre,
Lodhi Road, New Delhi 110013
Fax: (011) 4648451
In the Eye of the Fish
30 min, English, 1998
The film attempts to facilitate articulation in the field of education and foster a questioning attitude which lies dormant, but has the power to effect profound changes in both personality and environment. The film does not seek to be descriptive, it aims to engage in a dialogue with students to open up the space to share experiences. It is also an openness to dialogue and willingness to listen, which can help initiate a process leading to knowledge, self awareness and transformation.
Film by: Monica Narula, Shuddhabrata Sengupta, Jeebesh Bagchi
Source: Foundation for Universal Responsibility, UGF, Zone 4A, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi 110013
Fax: (011) 4648451
Seeds of Well Being
56min, English/Telugu, 1999
The film examines the relationship between health and people’s access to livelihood systems like land, water and forests. The film is based in the forest areas of the East Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh which is a pre-dominantly tribal area. An innovative health training programme involving the local community with a stress on reproductive health has been initiated in this region by a few NGOs. The film presents the health training and through questions raised during the training process, examines issues like patriarchy, land relations, access to natural resources, changes in cropping patterns, market and their effects on the health of the community. The film also examines the impact of Government policies and tries to see how health is not only about illnesses and services but is closely interlinked with larger issues that affect people’s lives.
Film by: Ranjan De
Source: Magic Lantern Foundation,
J-1881,Chittaranjan Park,
New Delhi 100019,
Fax: (011) 6231801
E-mail: magiclf@vsnl.com
Skin Deep
85 min, English, 1998
Skin Deep is an exploration of body images and self identity among contemporary urban middle class women in India, a feeling of being too dark, too fast, too old, that everyone experiences and attempts to come to terms with. The film attempts to trace the dynamics of the eternal search for the ideal feminity and how it permeates the image of women. Shot in the form of docu-feature, six first person narratives comprise the basic structure of the film.
Film by: Reena Mohan
Source: Majlis, Building no 4, Block A
Golden Valley,Kalina Kurla Road,
Kalina, Mumbai,-400096
Fax: (022) 6148539
E-mail: admin@majlis.ilbom.ernet.in
Ek Chingari ki khoj me
22 min, Hindi(with English subtitles), 1999
Violence on women due to dowry in India has reached such brutal dimensions that it has almost lost its news value. A woman being burnt for dowry is no longer a matter for debate. Behind these blatant forms of violence are a series of values which perpetuate and legitimise such oppression of women. This film is a short feature film attempting to question these values through the experiences of two women.
Film by: K.P.Sasi
Source: Madhyam, #1, 10th Cross, 10th Main, Vasant Nagar, Bangalore 560052
E-mail: madhyam@giasbg01.vsnl.net.in
The School that Karmi Soren Built
Bengali(with English subtitles), 1999
Karmi Soren, a young Santhal tribal inherits her father’s small plot of land after a court battle. She donates all her land to build a school in the village, which is the only school in the surrounding 13 villages. Karmi dies within a year of the opening the school in 1971. Despite pleas by the local people, the school continues to remain after 26 years. However, when it received tremendous media support after this film’s screening, the West Bengal Government was forced to recognise it in May 1997. The film is a tribute to Karmi Soren, the struggling woman who belonged to the lowest of low castes in rural Bengal.
Film by: Ananya Chatterjee
Source: Magic Lantern Foundation, J-1881, Chittaranjan Park, New Delhi 110019
Fax: (011) 6231801
E-mail: magiclf@vsnl.com
Dear Readers,
With your encouragement and support Media Mail has completed two years. In this entire period we have constantly been learning and trying to improve its quality and reach. Now we are happy to inform you of another step we have taken to make Media Mail independent and self-sufficient. From now on Media Mail will be published as “Media Linkages.” We are also in the process of registering Media Mail. Of course, this will not change its objective or concerns.
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-The Editors