Sun, June 20, 2021: 10:30 am to 12:30 pm Pacific time
Working on documentary film “Déjà vu”, the team of Bedabrata Pain, Sristy Agrawal, Rajashik Tarafder & Rumela Gangopadhyay, took a 10,000 km journey through the heart of rural America. They met farmers across the spectrum covering dairy, grain, poultry, beef and hog along the mid-western agricultural states. They found out why rural people supported Trump. A surprised discovery was that the American farm landscape, like India’s, is dominated by small farmers. They make up 90% of all farms, but produce only 25% by prices of products and that farmer suicide rates today are 4-5 times the national average in the US.
Exactly almost three decades ago, neoliberal economic reforms were inaugurated with much fanfare in India in form privatization and liberalization with the goal of making India more integrated with the international finance capital, as well as turning India into a world power. Today, the Modi government is trying to kick-start the unfinished agenda of reform – the latest being the opening up of the agricultural sectors to the corporates inside and outside India.
Starting with an overview of the market reforms in India, the presentation will focus on the recent farm laws in India. While successive have diverted and divided working people from mounting a concerted opposition to the reforms, the Modi government has faced serious push-back. The Indian farmers have dug their heels in and have openly challenged the government narrative through their six-month long unrelenting struggle.
Are the farmers misguided or being unreasonable? Are market reforms really the way forward for an ailing Indian agriculture? Who will benefit from these reforms and how?
These are hardly matters of speculation. Because eerily similar policies and initiatives have been carried out for the last four decades in this very country. This winter, we took a journey through the American heartland to chronicle the American farm experience. Presented in form of a documentary, it serves as a first-hand cautionary tale for all those who get swayed by the fables of prosperity that invariably accompany market-narratives. The presentation will conclude with the key findings of our work – findings that unequivocally challenge the market-reform myths that the Indian government is putting out.
FOLLOWED BY PANEL DISCUSSION with ALL THREE FILM-MAKERS: Bedabrata Pain, Rajashik Tarafder, and Sristi Agrawal.
BEDABRATA PAIN – Film-maker & Scientist
A leading member the team that invented of CMOS digital image sensor technology and enabled the digital camera revolution – from cell-phones to movie cameras – Dr. Bedabrata Pain holds over 90 patents and is an inductee to the US Space Technology Hall of Fame. He was an award-winning senior research scientist at NASA and Caltech for over 15 years, till he quit NASA to become a film-maker. And with his debut film Chittagong (2013), he won four Indian National Awards, including the prestigious Golden Lotus as the best first film and the best debut director, as well as awards in several international film festivals. Earlier, he was the executive producer of internationally acclaimed Amu (2005) and the documentary called Lifting the Veil (1997), and the writer of the book titled Behind the events in Kashmir (1991).
He received his B. Tech. degree from IIT Kharagpur in 1986, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1992. He taught courses in UCLA, and has received prestigious awards such as the Lew-Allen Award, NASA Inventors Award, and IIT Distinguished Alumnus Award. In addition to film-making, he is a technology consultant to a number of camera companies, including leading movie-camera makers such as RED. He has a keen interest in history, politics, philosophy, and quantum physics.
He is currently working on a number of feature films, documentaries, and web-series.
BEDABRATA PAIN – Film-maker & Scientist
A leading member the team that invented of CMOS digital image sensor technology and enabled the digital camera revolution – from cell-phones to movie cameras – Dr. Bedabrata Pain holds over 90 patents and is an inductee to the US Space Technology Hall of Fame. He was an award-winning senior research scientist at NASA and Caltech for over 15 years, till he quit NASA to become a film-maker. And with his debut film Chittagong (2013), he won four Indian National Awards, including the prestigious Golden Lotus as the best first film and the best debut director, as well as awards in several international film festivals. Earlier, he was the executive producer of internationally acclaimed Amu (2005) and the documentary called Lifting the Veil (1997), and the writer of the book titled Behind the events in Kashmir (1991).
He received his B. Tech. degree from IIT Kharagpur in 1986, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1992. He taught courses in UCLA, and has received prestigious awards such as the Lew-Allen Award, NASA Inventors Award, and IIT Distinguished Alumnus Award. In addition to film-making, he is a technology consultant to a number of camera companies, including leading movie-camera makers such as RED. He has a keen interest in history, politics, philosophy, and quantum physics.
He is currently working on a number of feature films, documentaries, and web-series.
