UPCOMING SCREENING:
Urban Cinema, World Urban Forum | 7th November 1400 hrs, Cairo, Egypt 2024
All Things Environmental Film Festival (ALTEFF) | 22nd November - 8th December, 2024
PAST SCREENINGS:
- 16th International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala (IDSFFK) | July 2024
- EcoReels Film Festival by Kriti Film Club, Alliance Francaise Delhi | June 2024
- London Climate Action Week, United Kingdom | June 2024
- Catalyst Social Impact 2024, Delhi | August 2024
Urban poor communities are disproportionately vulnerable to climate change, but there is little to no discourse on how it seeps into their neighborhoods and daily lives. The youth living in one of the most marginalized resettlement colonies in Mumbai, Govandi, are denied health insurance owing to high tuberculosis rates due to limited access to sunlight and open spaces in his neighborhood. It houses 25000 people across 61 buildings with each house being as tiny as 226 square feet. The youth here have to hide their addresses for jobs or educational opportunities to not be stigmatized as residents of Govandi. Such cases highlight the links between poor infrastructure[3] - a key component to deteriorating climate resilience - and social cohesion, public health and identities of vulnerable communities living in rapid urbanization.
Through the film we want to build awareness on climate sensitive and adaptive practices by understanding its local effects in the community. Building on my 6 years of on-ground engagement with one such vibrant resettlement colony, we creatively capture stories of crises and resilience and develop a local vocabulary for climate communication - one that is otherwise lost in the complex scientific terminologies that are prevalent today. Through this, we build a vernacular understanding of the impacts of climate change and enhance the community’s capacity for climate action in their built environments.
Through the award, a series of arts based research workshops was conducted using multiple mediums including drawings, photography, theatre and poetry to discuss the environmental changes and impacts the residents of Govandi are experiencing in their everyday lives. This film weaves together these experiences to create a local vocabulary for a more inclusive discourse around environmental and climate crises.
If you want to catch a screening or host one, write to me :)
Stills of the film
Arts based workshops
The film came together after a series of arts-based research workshop facilitated with the children, youth and women of Govandi. The workshop modules were designed keeping drawing, poetry, photography and theatre as approaches to bring to surface the various experiences of environmental changes that often go unobserved or unvocalised but impact the day to day. This arts based approach to the climate workshop was not only an evidence building tool, but more so an empathetic, non-extractive and participatory method to discuss issues that are otherwise too technical to understand.
Film and workshop credits:
Directed by Natasha Sharma
Produced by Global Resilience Partnership & Community Design Agency
Voices: Zeenat Shaikh, Wasim Shaikh, Shenaaz Khan, Umair Shaikh, Parveen Shaikh, Hidaya Ansari, Natasha Sharma, Rehan Malik, Mubashira Shaikh, Kanta Nadar, Mohammad
Drawings by
Shaziya Khan, Ifra Khan, Mubashira Shaikh, Zeenat Shaikh, Aaliya Shaikh, Ayesha Malik, Ayesha Shaikh, Shenaaz Khan, Mahek Khan, Asad Shaikh, Azad Shaikh, Javeria Khan, Sakina Khan, Bushra Khan,Khusboo Khan, Rehan Malik, Wasim Shaikh, Angle Nadar, Sofiya Qureshi, Suman Gangadiya, Pooja Gangadiya, Mahida Ansari, Hidaya Ansari, Zaibun Shaikh, Umair Shaikh, Mohammad
Story contributors
Parveen Shaikh, Kanta Nadar, Yasmeen Shaikh, Kalpana Patil, Saira Bano Shaikh, Kulsum Khan, Ruby Shaikh, Babee Shaikh, Afsana Shaikh, Keshkasha Khan, Samreen Mukri, Shaheen Shaikh, Paru Shetty & Badrunnisa Shaikh
Special thanks to Pankaj Singh Kumar, Aanchal Kapur (Kriti Film Club) and Sandhya Naidu Janardhan
Animation by Triparna Maiti
Sound Design by Kalesh Lakshmanan
Script: Natasha Sharma, Mansi Bhalerao
Photographs: Rajesh Vora , Prachi Metawala
Workshop Facilitators: Natasha Sharma, Nikhil Sharma, Himanshu Meena
Community Organiser: Parveen Shaikh
Coordinators: Sana Shaikh, Tayyaba Darvesh, Mansi Bhalerao
Coordinators: Sana Shaikh, Tayyaba Darvesh, Mansi Bhalerao
Subtitles by: Akanksha Gupta
Audio recording: Sandra Alexander, Sana Shaikh, Affan, Mansi Bhalerao
Rap by Code 43 - Mateen Ansari, Kasim Shaikh, Zaheer Choudhary, Shahid Sayyed
Project by: Community Design Agency, ElemenTree Foundation, Global Resilience Partnership.
