In the light of the murder of Gauri Lankesh, do you see a threat against dissenting voices?
What we are witnessing is an unprecedented phase in the history of Indian democracy, where there is a concerted attempt through a variety of means — through party-owned television channels, stories planted in social media, fake news sites, and so on — where critics are being targeted, vilified, presented like monsters so that hate can be directed towards them. This is why we are seeing an unprecedented rise in physical threats and intimidation, and the worst of it has of course manifested in Gauri’s killing.
How do you practise dissent in your work?
It’s not as if I deliberately set out to practise dissent. I make films on issues and events that agitate me, that I feel that have not been adequately looked at with their complexities, in the mainstream media. Because the kinds of themes I explore — the politics of hate and intolerance, and so on — [my work] is perceived as dissent by the political forces that practise that politics of hate and intolerance.
Do you feel a sense of threat?
An overall climate is [being] created; there is an attempt to intimidate. Gauri’s killing is not silencing her alone; it is meant to be a signal to a larger fraternity — journalists, media, filmmakers and artists — who are raising their voices: it is a blatant attempt to intimidate all of us.
Have you received intimidations? How have you tackled it?
There was a screening organised of my film, Final Solution (2004) at a festival called Films of Freedom in July 2004, and my film was to be the opening film. Swadeshi Jagaran Manch created a ruckus and prevented the screening from happening. So the solution was that it wasn’t shown that evening but we screened it the next morning and shifted the venue.
