Women & the Camera

Parul Sharma Delhi

It was a film festival by women, for women and of women in its truest sense. Maybe that's why majority of the viewers were women.

Launched on International Women's Day, the three-day festival titled "Expressions in Freedom" showcased documentary films by Asian women.

A joint venture by the International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT) — a non-profit, professional organisation of women in electronic and allied media — and the India International Centre (IIC), Asia Project, the films covered issues relating to gender and its interface with sexuality, violence and conflict, family, identity, human rights and cultural transformation.

Some of the films had serious political and social themes. Sri Lanka's Sharmini Boyle's documentary Rajeshwari explored the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) conflict and its impact on the lives of the populace while Until When… followed the lives of four Palestinian families living in a refugee camp near Bethlehem. Beena Sarwar's work narrated a poignant story about a 17 year old girl in Pakistan who "dared" to contemplate a career in a male-dominated society, while India Cabaret by the internationally acclaimed Mira Nair, focussed on a group of women strippers working in a Mumbai nightclub, exploring female stereotypes and revealing the double standards of contemporary Indian society.

There were films that celebrated womanhood in all its aspects, either through the life of the poetess-princess Mirabai or Homai Vyarawalla, India's first woman photojournalist or the musical journey of mirasins, singing life-cycle songs for their patrons in Punjab or even the travellers of the Ladies Special train in Mumbai.

In addition to screening the works of professional filmmakers, the festival also served as a platform for rural women to showcase their experience with the camera. The Deccan Development Society's Communication Media Trust has been training rural women to utilize the video camera to articulate their concerns. "Ten Women & A Camera" was a film made by these women on the process of filmmaking and how it had impacted their lives.

Incidentally, this is only the second such event organised in India by the 52-year old IAWRT that was set up during the Second World War to highlight more significant roles for women in society. "The reason," says Jai Chandiram, the first Asian President of the organisation, "was that it used to be more Europe-centric. Now we are moving towards Asian and non-European countries."

The organisers deliberately excluded feature films from the event in favour of only documentaries. "How many people are aware of the concept of documentaries? Feature films already have an audience. The idea is to familiarize people with this form of media," said Chandiram.

The festival, though sparsely attended, was certainly a step towards promoting and celebrating documentary films. IIC Director PC Sen promised to make the festival a regular feature and to acquire these films for the archives of the institution.