Two in hand
Truth in black and white Ashvin Kumar
Film
Ashvin Kumar set out to make a YouTube video and ended up with a National Award winner, finds Sonam Joshi. Last year, Oscar-nominated director Ashvin Kumar’s Inshallah, Football won the National Award in the category of Best Film on Social Issues, after a long review by the Censor Board. Kumar chose to release its sequel Inshallah, Kashmir directly on YouTube, and the feature won Best Investigative Film. The earlier film followed a single character – teenage Kashmiri footballer Basharat Baba– and his struggle to get a passport to travel to Brazil on a scholarship despite his father’s role as the former leader of the armed group Hizb-ulMujahideen. By contrast, Inshallah, Kashmir presents a broader picture of the conflict. Kumar, who is working on his next script (another feature on Kashmir, from a child’s perspective) spoke to Time Out over the phone. You shot most of the film in 2009, during the making of your last film Inshallah, Football. The former militant Bashir Baba also makes an appearance in both. When did you decide to utilize the footage to make a second film? It took me nine months to edit the first film. We had so much footage of different persuasions and stories, which was straining at the narratives of Inshallah, Football.
68 www.timeoutdelhi.net April 12 – 25 2013
That narrative had to be about this kid. We filmed so much extensive footage of around 400 hours. I started cataloguing the interviews to make short films to put up on YouTube, but slowly that archiving project became an entire feature film. All the footage in this film was because we filmed so much with Bashir. He was… someone who went to Pakistan, got disillusioned. [He] comes back but cannot get out of militancy, is ultimately captured, surrenders, goes back to jail, comes out, starts his own business, and till today continues to be harassed. He inevitably started becoming one the main interlocutors of the second film. As was Kashmiri Pandit Dr Amit Wanchoo [head of the only pharmaceutical company in Kashmir]. Funnily, both of them have very similar perspectives, separated by two generations and religion. But the idea was [also] to create a personal diary of Kashmir – that’s why I put in my voiceover. The film often uses montage of interviews presenting two different perspectives, for instance that of the Kashmiri Pandit couple, the Wakhloos, and an ex-militant. What made you adopt this stylistic device? It was to produce a jarring effect of giving perspective. No one narrative is complete in itself. The minute you think that your sympathies lie with one group, like the kidnapped Wakhloos, you are forced to look at the militant’s life and try and understand his per-
spective [of] a poor labourer. Militancy in Kashmir is complicated, not simple as it’s made out to be. What were your reasons for putting up the film online last year, taking it down and then uploading it again this year, after it won the National Award? The first time was more of a protest against censorship. It was also a little sensational because we were putting it up on Republic Day [2012]. It was only on for a few days, I didn’t want to expose it too much. A year later, the film has done its festival rounds. I just said that I would put it online on for free. The idea is to make it democratic and free for the audience and to generate revenue from advertising. This is a model that we are experimenting with on YouTube. At least I get the film shown. Last year, 1,00,000 people watched it. Onir and I have been spearheading this campaign [Save Indie Cinema; www.change.org/ saveindie]. Prasar Bharati has agreed to our demand to purchase satellite rights of all National Award-winning films [so they can be broadcast on TV], if your film goes to any of the 20 empanelled film festivals. Not only will film makers be able to earn revenues, but they will also be encouraged to make new films. Inshallah, Kashmir will be screened on Fri Apr 12 at India Habitat Centre. See Other film screenings.