As the River flows
I know
long ago
the river used to speak.
But when he realised
every drop of pain
flows above horizon of words
he surrendered to silence.
People came to his bosom
creating to destroy
and named it civilization.
People came to his bosom
looking for the meaning in destruction
and called it history.
More the time flows
more the time remains still.
More the things change
more the things remain the same.
The drops of pain
mounting on the bank –
will it overflow…
as the River flows?
In the India’s state of Assam, during the last 2 decades, over 15,000 lives have been lost to insurgency and an unknown number of people remain traceless till date…
You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?’- G. B. Shaw
“Bidyut, let me be honest with you. I agree with you completely that this story need to be told. But let me tell you, none of us are going to touch this film. It is too risky” – that was the CEO of a reputed film production house talking to me towards the end of last year. He was just one of many …
But the thought that came to my mind was if we don’t ask those questions, then who will? I may not have answers to these questions, but does it mean that I am not entitled even to ask the questions??
To cut the long story short, I did manage to ask a few questions. I did manage to get NFDC convinced so that I could ask those questions through as the River flows… Actually we ended up making two versions of the same film – ‘as the River flows’ in Hindi and ‘Ekhon Nedekha Nadir Xhipare’ in Assamese. But that is just the beginning.
What are these questions are we talking about here? Well, some very basic human questions. Take for example, a couple of guys come to your house, take out a revolver, keep it on the table & says, ‘we are hungry’. What will you do? Even if you don’t have enough for yourself, you will feed those guys I guess. After all, it does not make much sense to argue with people who carry guns, does it? After they leave, the police come and pick you up. Reasons? – ‘giving food and shelter to terrorists!’
Whenever we talk of terrorism, we know the point of view of the terrorists. After all, they survive on propaganda. The people opposing them also have no option but to counter those propagandas, so we know about their point of view as well. But what gets lost in this crossfire of propagandas is the point of view of the common man – in spite of being the vast majority, who have long lost their voices.
This, unfortunately, is true in any place that is facing the problem of terrorism – whether it is Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Kashmir or Assam. Yes, in this film I’m talking about Assam as I know her better than any other place. But the story of as the River flows could very well have been a story in any part of this world. The story of my films protagonist Sudakshina could very well have been my story. Or yours.
One question remains, ‘how do I ensure that those questions which we ask as the River flows reach the like minded people?’ For any small film, that is a big question. That’s when I had decided, hesitantly, to reach out to you…
Together we are not alone.
Tags: As The River Flows, Assam, Ekhon Nedekha Nadir Xhipare, G. B. Shaw, nfdc
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Welcome to PFC, Bidyutda. Looking forward to the film. When and where is the release?
Lovely article and heart-warmer of a promo, Bidyut. How do I get to watch this? How are you planning to distribute this movie?
Bidyut,
Superb. Shall wait to watch the film. Much required impetus for the Assam film industry
“Together we are not alone”
.
mashallah!!! all the very best!
Very touching- I have heard accounts of people who have seen life in terrorism ridden areas closely and they always say that there is more to it than meets the eye- the common man is usually between the rock and a hard place and often the choices they make are only based on survival instincts… often not based on any kind of ideology since they have nowhere to turn and must find their own way to stay alive- it will be nice to see the common man’s perspective- the section that is most deeply affected and most easily ignored… look forward to the movie- good luck.
Thanks for the good wishes…The film has some 15 days work left. Don’t konow about the release date as yet – it is producer’s domain. Any suggestion regarding distribution etc?
A very touching article…I hope ur msg gets across to all the ppl and ur movie is able to serve the purpose for which it is made by you. All the very best.
I hope the movie releases in my city…pls let me know the release date , waiting to chk it out.