Friends and activists Bhau Korde and Waqar Khan work with neighborhood peace committees in Dharavi, Mumbai to promote conflict resolution through the collective production and use of visual media. Korde and Khan are both long-time residents of Dharavi and both first-generation migrants to the city.
As Asia's largest slum, with a population of 800,000, Dharavi has often been represented as a breeding ground for filth, vice and poverty, full of immigrants whose right to live in the city is often questioned by vigilante citizens' groups and right-wing politicians. However, Dharavi's long history of immigration has created a creative, productive space which plays an important role in the economy of the city; it is one of the major hubs of the informal sector that produces commodities ranging from food products to leather goods catering to a large export market.
When the deadly riots of 1992-93 tore the city and their community apart, Korde and Khan were moved to act, working to change both the negative perception of Dharavi and erase religious and ethnic divisions. Naata follows these remarkable men as they work on their film, Ekta Sandesh - their work paralleling that of Naata's own filmmakers, another filmmaking pair who are immigrants to their city of Bombay.
Traveling with a projector and a screen, Korde and Khan show the film at their own expense in communities savaged by distrust and prejudice. The two pairs of filmmakers join forces in this documentary to spread their important message even further.
SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS
Film South Asia 2003, Kathmandu
River to River Film Festival, Florence, 2003
The First and Last Experimental Film Festival, Sydney, 2003
World Social Forum Film Festival, Mumbai, 2004
Vikalp-Films for Freedom, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai and New Delhi, 2004