What will it take for cinema from Uttarakhand to gain national recognition?

While cinema from Uttarakhand is proudly rooted in the state’s culture and even highlights societal concerns, identifying an audience is still an uphill task

On 11 May 2023, Maati Pehchaan (2022) became the first Kumaoni film to be screened at a pan-Indian film festival. Featured in the line-up for the 15th Habitat Film Festival held at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi, it is one of a kind—the first Uttarakhandi film to be made “Bollywood-style”. 

Shot on location in Uttarakhand, it traces the lives of a young boy and a girl from the same idyllic village, who grow up in vastly different circumstances due to their socio-economic backgrounds. While the director Ajay Berry describes the film as “a love story” at its heart, the central themes of land ownership, migration of the youth in search of employment, and Kumaoni identity are apparent from the very first scenes of the leading couple’s courtship. Faraz Shere, the producer of the film, is a creative director who hails from Lucknow. Having visited Uttarakhand numerous times as a child, it was the scenic beauty of the state that fascinated him. However, it was his work with various news channels like Zee News and India TV that brought home to him the real problem of the region.

Back to one’s roots

“There are no job opportunities in Uttarakhand,” Shere said in an interview before the screening. “A large number of people migrate out of Uttarakhand looking for work. Meanwhile, people with a lot of wealth are investing in land in the region, building resorts and minting money.” When Shere was approached by Farooq Khan, the director of photography for Maati Pehchaan, and Berry, he jumped at the opportunity to finance a film about a neglected issue. His own experience as a creative director meant that he became intimately involved with the making of the film, offering his creative inputs to the director and cinematographer.

For Berry, it wasn’t just another film. The director mentioned in a conversation with this writer that Maati Pehchaan is one in a line of films he intends to make that are rooted in the hills—in the language, culture, and the quotidian experiences of the locals. Having worked in the media for the last 25 years, Berry wanted to make a lasting intervention into commercial cinema in Uttarakhand. To him, Maati Pehchaan is but the first step in achieving what he terms as his muheem (mission).

Navigating challenges

To understand why the film marks a significant turning point, it is important to examine the history of cinema in Uttarakhand. Though the state often plays host to filmmakers with its scenic locations, cinema made in local languages is relatively young. Jagwal, the first Garhwali feature film, was released on 4 May 1983 at a non-commercial cinema hall in Delhi. The producer, Parashar Gaur, conceived of the film as long ago as 1975. Many battles with financers later, he opened the film to an eager audience of hundreds of diasporic Uttarakhandi people in the capital city. Tickets usually priced at ₹5 sold for a whopping ₹100 each on the opening night. Within a few years, in 1987, the first Kumaoni-language film Megha Aa was released as well. 

Despite this hopeful beginning, Uttarakhandi cinema still faces a number of problems. Larger settlements like Nainital have only one cinema hall, and managers refrain from playing Garhwali or Kumaoni cinema, afraid that they will not generate enough earnings. Cinema halls across the region find it difficult to sustain themselves, and the Uttaranchal Cinema Federation reports that even in 2018, out of 70 halls in the state, 48 had shut down. The ubiquity of digital media now means that OTT platforms or YouTube find some takers for local films to reach a larger audience, but is not without its challenges. There is a paucity of adequate subtitling, making the films inaccessible to the local youth who are no longer fluent in their language. 

Noting these difficulties, the state government of Uttarakhand has taken steps to develop Uttarakhand as a film destination. Work has begun towards the establishment of a ‘Film City’, and filmmakers both from and outside of Uttarakhand are provided a subsidy if they shoot and process their films within the state. In an effort to generate employment through a robust local film industry, the government also encourages film production in local dialects like Garhwali and Kumaoni. Unfortunately, these measures still fall short. Speaking about the ecosystem of finance in local cinema, Shere mentioned that financers do not invest large amounts of money into Kumaoni and Garhwali cinema. Most financers invest a maximum of ₹50 lakhs into a film slated to release in these languages, owing to an assumption that it will not generate more revenue. In addition, film distributors and financers are used to testing the waters with their releases. Shere recounted the practice of releasing a film first in Haldwani, letting it run for a week, and taking it elsewhere.

Identifying an audience

In all of these aspects, Maati Pehchaan stands apart as a new kind of film. For one, Shere invested nearly ₹1.5 crores into its making, inevitably scaling up the production in terms of the cinematography, background music, and song-and-dance sequences. This ‘Bollywood-style’ production was then released last year in 17 theatres across Uttarakhand simultaneously. Shere reported that the people who saw the film were highly impressed; some even remarking that it was the most dazzling production they had ever seen in their language. Shere and Berry did not, however, reach the audience they wanted to with their release.

Born and raised in Almora, Berry wanted his film to appeal to the lay audience from Uttarakhand, “people from communities in villages.” He intentionally kept the film to a template that is popularly accepted—catchy songs exploring young love in all its joy and its vicissitudes, a good helping of melodrama, action sequences, and the villain as a munimji (moneylender), a character that would be instantly recognisable to anyone raised on a fare of Bollywood masala films. 

The core problems of youth migrating from Uttarakhand to larger cities in search of employment, or the plight of young women who are denied an education in favour of early marriages, are touched upon lightly within the narrative itself, sometimes even couched as a debate between the two young protagonists. In his interview, Berry outlined the lack of infrastructure supporting such ventures—even densely populated areas in Uttarakhand do not have halls that can seat more than 500 people, and the young have largely lost interest in productions made in local languages. Under the well-financed sway of films and music made in Hindi, Garhwali and Kumaoni youth have lost touch with their own language, and ultimately, with the local culture that binds them to the land. This disconnect in language reared its head during the making of the film as well, with the lead actor, Karan Goswami. According to Berry, he was not entirely comfortable speaking in Kumaoni, and his dialogues had to be kept to a minimum to retain the emotive charge of scenes he appeared in. The enjoyable songs of the film are meant to grab the interest of this audience in particular, to urge them to immerse themselves in the joys of exploring their local language.

Small steps towards recognition 

Ultimately, then, Maati Pehchaan is a film about identity. Every scene in the film ties the characters back to the visceral connection they hold with the land. Both Chandra Bisht, who plays the heroine’s mother, and Annkita Parihar, the female lead, are depicted as characters intimately attached to their land, and drawing their strength and motivations from it. The director insisted on the involvement of local artists, hoping that their presence on the silver screen would generate pride within the community, and a small section of this was amply visible during the film’s screening at the India Habitat Centre. Berry continues towards fulfilling his muheem this year, as he works on the script of his upcoming film in Almora, titled Thir Thaam. 

A small section of the receptive audience in Haldwani, Almora and Nainital have encouraged both him and Shere in their effort, hoping to see more films of the kind. The inclusion of a Kumaoni film in a pan-Indian film festival in the capital city is a ray of hope, for not just the cast and crew, but the numerous talented artists of Uttarakhand waiting for their opportunity to shine. That the film presents a simple, touching story while retaining its core tenets, even to an audience in Delhi that may not know the language well, goes on to show that with a little bit of support, Uttarakhandi cinema can bring universally human stories to world, generating a viewership that will transcend the boundaries of the state. 

Also Read: Why film restoration in India is still an uphill climb

Also Read: Why does VFX in Indian cinema lack finesse?

Also Read: Are Bollywood films finally normalising divorce?