Rattled by the apathy towards domestic violence survivors, Nandita Das makes 7-minute film to encourage them to reach out with help from UNESCO, UNICEF and other UN agencies
Ankita Chaurasia (MUMBAI MIRROR; May 26, 2020)

According to a National Commission of Women (NCW) report published mid-April, instances of domestic violence had doubled across India within just three weeks of the countrywide lockdown, which was imposed on March 25.

On April 6, United Nations chief, António Guterres, too, called for measures to address a “horrifying global surge in domestic violence” in the wake of Coronavirus-induced lockdowns around the world. This, after The World Health Organisation predicted that the risk of intimate partner violence is likely to increase with people being encouraged to practice social distancing.

For actor-filmmaker Nandita Das, the alarming statistics spurred a spontaneous response to the irony of the ‘stay home, stay safe’ phrase. She decided to lend her voice to the issue to encourage women to speak up and for us to listen. Enlisting support from UN agencies like UNESCO, UNFPA, UNICEF, UN Women and the South Asia Foundation (Madanjeet Singh Foundation), Nandita is all set to release her short film, Listen to Her, across social media platforms today at noon. “It was amazing that UNESCO came on board as a partner and their India head, Eric Falt, went and garnered more support from their sister organisations, like UNICEF, UN Women, UNFPA and South Asia Foundation. I am truly grateful to them as they will use the film to sustain the campaign to break the silence. After all it is a call to action with helplines for women to reach out to,” asserts Nandita, urging survivors to reach out on helpline numbers 181 and 112 for help.

So, what prompted her to make a film in the midst of a crisis? “When we speak of abuse, it is not just physical violence, but also emotional and mental abuse. Even before my masters in social work I was aware of what women were going through. Just because we, as a society, fail to speak about this issue enough, does not mean that it doesn’t exist,” she says, pointing out that she has friends and relatives who’ve been in abusive situations and community work brought her closer to such people too, both in urban and rural areas across the country. “It is rampant, across regions and class. The silence around it is unnerving.”

Nandita admits it was creatively challenging to shoot the seven-minute film during lockdown. With no crew, camera, or tripod stand for her phone, she used her old phone to record the sound separately and coordinated with two members of her team on Zoom to view the footage while she was shooting. “It was all shot in my living room. Just me and my son, Vihaan—a cast of two!” she informs, adding that they shot over three mornings with her cook, Bharat, as the camera operator, as she realised that the light changes by noon.

Nandita would perch the phone on stacked-up books, run to her position, give her son instructions, turn on the audio recorder on her other phone, ask Bharat to press recording, clap to call out the shot and the take number, and only then begin to perform. “Amidst all this chaos, it was difficult to remember the dialogues I had written myself, but I managed to improvise as I knew the crux of it. I had to imagine all the sounds—on the phone, the other characters, the whistle of the cooker - everything had to be in my head. This ordeal was a good reminder that filmmaking is, after all, a collaborative process.”

She admits that her favourite part of filmmaking has always been post production—editing, sound and music and some of the best in the industry, readily agreed to contribute to this film remotely. “Their willingness was heartwarming, but it was still tough. So many files were going back and forth, uploads and downloads. I am so not a techie but after this experience I might have just become one!” she exclaims.

Along with inspiring survivors to reach out for immediate assistance, the film, which is a simple story of two women—one overburdened by increased workload, another locked down with abuser—impacting each other, aims to bring about gender equality in the post-Covid world. “This lockdown still seems surreal. None of us ever imagined or experienced anything like this before. Personally, I have nothing to complain about. I largely work from home, so not much has changed except having to engage my son and the umpteen requests for online engagements,” she says, surprised at how quickly everyone is adapting to the new reality. “But what a bubble we live in because this is not a shared reality with millions of people who have nothing to eat, struggling to get home and have no livelihood. These gaps in equality are not a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. They were hidden in plain sight that are simply more apparent in this lockdown. For women in particular, it has been the most difficult,” she concludes.

Nandita Das talks about being a student again and her next project
Roshmilla Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; November 20, 2014)

It's been four months since Nandita Das has gone back to school on a Yale fellowship. Walking through the university campus, en route to a class on Ethics, the actress-director sounds a trifle breathless even though it's not yet 9 am across the Atlantic.

"My day begins at 6.30 am attending to urgent mails, getting ready and then going and dropping Vihaan (her four-year-old son) to the day care before heading to my classes. It's not easy being a single mother here and I've come to realise just how privileged we are to have help back home. But despite the hectic schedule, learning just for the love of it, is lot of fun," she says cheerfully.

After sitting through seven-eight different classes in the first few weeks, Nandita opted for the course on Ethics and Women and Global Affairs, besides her own course on Leadership, and has been balancing her time between seminars and talks on various issues like colour bias, role of art in social change, gender inequality and Indo-Pak relations. She has also screened two of her films, Firaaq and Bawandar, and the cineplay, Between the Lines, at Yale and in NY.

"We are a motley bunch that includes a Presidential candidate from Iceland, a constitutional law expert from Tunisia and a Colombian who runs an NGO on multi-culturism. It's a stimulating environment to discuss issues of common concerns in a diverse group of 16 World Fellows and also to get an opportunity to interact with the students and faculty at Yale. Communicating with people of different nationalities and walks of life has given me a perspective that goes beyond my reality of India," says an excited Nandita who had imagined that she would also get time to work on her script with her co-writer in New York, but finds that there is a lot more on her plate at Yale. "But the few sessions we have had, have been very productive."

Nandita will announce her next as a director on her return. It is a period film set in the pre-Partition India and she has been researching on it for over a year now. "I have so much material that I now have to decide what to keep and what to leave as all of it is so exciting. While it is historical, it is hugely relevant today," she asserts.

Will she act in the film too? "I don't see any important role that would fit me. I will only if a character emerges who 'looks' like me. Since this film is drawn from history, I have to cast actors who look the part," she reasons, admitting she'd like to collaborate with a foreign producer who wouldn't insist on songs or mainstream stars to Bollywoodise the project. "It's a sensitive and powerful subject and I don't want to make any compromises. A co-production between an Indian producer and an international one would be my ideal choice."

She admits that she made Firaaq only for an Indian audience thinking no one outside would understand the issues it raised and the context it came from. "But my experiences at screenings across the globe proved that the struggle for identity, prejudice and sectarian violence are issues all around the world," says Nandita reminiscing her time with Firaaq in International festivals.

Even at Yale the questions asked after the recent screening, she's come to realise that while NRIs are the big market for Bollywood, the global audience is also interested in Indian films that go beyond the mainstream. "We don't have to become less local in our search for a global audience. Human stories travel beyond borders,"she asserts.

Nandita has been commissioned to script an Indian woman's journey to Western Australia for Dalip Sondhi and Robyn Kershaw, an Australian producer. "I'll start writing in January. They want me to act and direct too. Not sure how I will juggle between the two projects," she says.

Before that, after weeks of Skype, she will have a grand reunion with husband Subodh Maskara. They will spend 10 days together, on the campus and in Chicago where they have been invited for two screenings of their CinePlay, bring in Thanksgiving with an American friend, before Subodh returns to India with Vihaan. "The last 12 days I will be by myself, to focus on what remains to be done and what lies ahead in the new year," she rings off, returning to being student for another day.