DOCUMENTARY BEARS WITNESS: TRAVELLING FILM SOUTHASIA 2018- A FESTIVAL OF SOUTH ASIAN DOCUMENTARIES

 

Is it Too Much to Ask (India)

(30 min; 2017; dvd; English subtitles)

Director: Leena Manimekalai

 

Is it Too Much to Ask follows the journey of two friends, Smile and Glady, looking for a rental apartment in Chennai and the obstacles and social stigma they encounter in the process for being single and for being transgender women. A delicate documentary that treats a sensitive subject with lightness while exposing society’s prejudices

 

At 18:40 

32 Souls (Myanmar)

(25 min; 2016; dvd; English subtitles)

Director: Sai Naw Kham

 

A quietly poetic work on the rhythms of daily life, of mortality, and the persistence of memory in Myanmar

 

At 19:15 

Fireflies in the Abyss (India)

(88 min; 2015; dvd; English & with subtitles)

Director: Chandrasekhar Reddy

 

In the Jaintia Hills of Northeast India, boys and men descend into the abyss of the 'rat-holes' to scratch coal out of hard rock, with nothing more than a pickaxe and a head-torch. One of them is Suraj, an 11-year old boy. Born in the mines to Nepali immigrants, Suraj cherishes the hope of getting out of the coal-pit someday. But despite the hardships and pain of separation, we see pride, generosity and sacrifice

 

DOCUMENTARY BEARS WITNESS: TRAVELLING FILM SOUTHASIA 2018 - A FESTIVAL OF SOUTH ASIAN DOCUMENTARIES

1 TO 4 AUGUST 2018

 

A festival of 12 exceptional nonfiction films from South Asia produced in the last two years. The festival encapsulates the flavors of the Subcontinent with filmsabout people from Afghanistan, Burma, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. The festival includes the award winners of Film Southasia Festival 2017, Kathmandu as well as other films selected to showcase the variety, treatment and intensity that marks the world of Southasian documentary and non-fiction. Organised with Film Southasia, Kathmandu; and in collaboration with New Imaginations: Jindal School of Journalism and Communication, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonepat

 

AT 18:00

Introduction

By Ms Mitu Varma, Director Film Southasia, Kathmandu

 

Followed by

Amdavad Ma Famous (Famous in Ahmedabad; India)

(30 min; 2015; dvd; English subtitles)

Director: Hardik Mehta

 

Set during the kaleidoscopic backdrop of the biggest kite-flying festival in India, Amdavad ma Famous, an uplifting transformation of 11-year-old Zaid from child to passionate and aggressive kite-runner

 

AT 18:45 

Demons in Paradise (Sri Lanka)

(94 min; 2017; dvd; English & with subtitles)

Director: Jude Ratnam

 

A Tamil documentary filmmaker in Sri Lanka analyses the two-and half decade long civil war from the inside 

Visiting Dolpo

Illustrated lecture by Deb Mukharji, writer and photographer

 

Chair: Shri Shyam Saran, Life Trustee, IIC

 

Dolpo in mid-western Nepal is the least visited part of the country where the Bon religion is widely practised. The fame lake Shey Phoksondo in central Dolpo is surrounded by peaks, glaciers and steep gorges. A photographic account of a recent visit…

 

 

 

Felicitation

To felicitate Soumitra Chatterjee and Goutam Ghosh

 

In the Fountain Lawns

Cultural Evening

With Soumitra Chatterjee and Goutam Ghosh

 

Followed at 19:15 in Multipurpose Hall & Seminar Rooms I to III, Kamaladevi Complex

 

Film: Dekha (Vision/Bengali)

(123 min; 2000; dvd; English subtitles)

Directed by Goutam Ghosh who will introduce the film

 

Recipient of the Award for Best Feature Film in Bengali; & Special Jury Award to Soumitra Chatterjee, 48th National Film Awards 2001; and Silver Montgolfiere, Nantes Three Continents Festival 2001 

 

In Dekha Gautam Ghose makes a veiled attack against the winds of change sweeping our society. Based on a story by Sunil Gangopadhyay, all the characters in the film are caught in the web of life, sometimes owing to their flaws, or that of their spouse.The film chronicles the life of an ageing poet who has seen the world but is now nearly blind with glaucoma  

 

(Collaboration: Impresario India)

ROSALIND WILSON MEMORIAL LECTURE 2018

 

A Critique of Indian Federation News

Speaker: Shri Karan Thapar

Chair: Shri Soli J. Sorabjee, Life Trustee, IIC

 

(Organised by the Rosalind Wilson Memorial Trust)

Madrasas and the Making of Islamic Womanhood

Release of the book by Hem Borker (Oxford University Press, 2018)

 

Followed by a discussion

Speakers: Prof. Ashis Nandy, Political Psychologist and Social Theorist; Dr. David Mills, Associate Professor in Pedagogy and the Social Sciences, Department of Education, University of Oxford; Dr. Mohammad Talib, Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Fellow, Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, University of Oxford; and Dr. Aseem Prakash, Professor, School of Public Policy and Governance, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Hyderabad

 

Amongst the few ethnographic studies on girl’s madrasas in India, the book focuses on unfolding of young women’s lives as they journey from their home to madrasas and beyond. The study problematizes the idealized and coherent notions of piety presented by anthropological literature on female participation in Islamic piety projects. The author’s ethnographic portraits challenge the dominant media’s representation of madrasas as outmoded religious institutions.

 

Hem Borker has completed her D.Phil from the University of Oxford, U.K where she was a Clarendon Scholar. She is Assistant Professor, Centre for Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy, Jamia Millia Islamia

 

(Collaboration: Jan Pahal Trust; and Oxford University Press)

Aaj Kavita

Suman Keshari (Delhi), Upasana Jha (Samastipur), Pankaj Chaturvedi (Kanpur) and Shashi Bhooshan (Ujjain)

 

(Collaboration: The Raza Foundation)

CANCELLED

THE AMBASSADOR SERIES

 

Details of the programme will be announced later 

 

(Collaboration: Ananta Aspen Centre)