Flickering Lights
India
Anirban Dutta & Anupama Srinivasan
Far from the mainland and mainstream consciousness, in a region ridden with uncertainties, Tora is a quaint village with bad roads, erratic transport service, a dysfunctional school, no hospital, no power supply, no mobile network, and no job opportunities.
The film invites us to experience the life of the people, evenings spent in darkness intercepted by small solar lamps. When they hear that electricity may arrive, they are hardly excited. They have been let down too often.
The film will follow the lives of a hard-working couple, Jasmine and Ninghan. Jasmine is a feisty woman trying to make a place for herself in a deeply patriarchal society, and Ninghan is her supportive husband. Keen for their children to get a good education, she sends them to a boarding school, but they can barely afford it. She anxiously awaits electricity as she dreams of buying a refrigerator and setting up a small snack-stall in Tora.
Running in parallel is the story of the electricity work that happens in fits and starts. There are long delays because of economic blockades by political groups, incessant rains, and inadequate labour, and quite often due to sheer lack of intent on the part of the electricity department. What unfolds is absurd - scenes of bumbling linesmen and skeptical villagers. Watching this unfold is Khamrang, the 98-year-old who has seen it all and believes that nothing will change.
The story takes us to a milieu, where basic amenities that are taken for granted in urban lives, do not exist. People here have modern aspirations but have been forced to live in another time zone. The film follows the long, complex, and bizarre story of how electricity makes its way here. When will electricity arrive in Tora? Will it stay and transform people’s lives? The film waits to see.
The film invites us to experience the life of the people, evenings spent in darkness intercepted by small solar lamps. When they hear that electricity may arrive, they are hardly excited. They have been let down too often.
The film will follow the lives of a hard-working couple, Jasmine and Ninghan. Jasmine is a feisty woman trying to make a place for herself in a deeply patriarchal society, and Ninghan is her supportive husband. Keen for their children to get a good education, she sends them to a boarding school, but they can barely afford it. She anxiously awaits electricity as she dreams of buying a refrigerator and setting up a small snack-stall in Tora.
Running in parallel is the story of the electricity work that happens in fits and starts. There are long delays because of economic blockades by political groups, incessant rains, and inadequate labour, and quite often due to sheer lack of intent on the part of the electricity department. What unfolds is absurd - scenes of bumbling linesmen and skeptical villagers. Watching this unfold is Khamrang, the 98-year-old who has seen it all and believes that nothing will change.
The story takes us to a milieu, where basic amenities that are taken for granted in urban lives, do not exist. People here have modern aspirations but have been forced to live in another time zone. The film follows the long, complex, and bizarre story of how electricity makes its way here. When will electricity arrive in Tora? Will it stay and transform people’s lives? The film waits to see.