The embattled filmmaker who was embroiled in the Nirbhaya documentary controversy lives in Birmingham, UK. When you say
“Leslee Udwin”
the first thing that comes to mind is “East
is East”. An actress to begin with, after attaining fame in her work,
she switched to production. A prominent personality among the NRIs and
feminists in UK. Winning the BAFTA award
in 1999, was the first turning point in
her career as it was her first feature film as a producer. Leslee’s documentary
India’s Daughter, about the
case of 23-year-old Jyoti Singh (Nirbhaya), who was gang raped and murdered in
Delhi in 2012 was part of the BBC’s Storyville series and aired on
channels internationally but was banned
for broadcast in India. That was the second turning point.
The documentary containing the interview of Mukesh Singh, an unrepentant
criminal who was involved in the rape
invoked India’s resentment--the outrage was not just for Mukesh, but
also towards the documentary for providing a platform to a criminal who showed
no remorse to Nirbhaya. Leslee’s other
works includes West is West, Mrs Ratcliffe’s Revolution, Merchant
of Venice (actress).
Crisp, candid and hard-hitting. Leslee clears the air and addresses some
serious issues…….
What
prompted you to pick Nirbhaya’s case as your subject?
The response to the
Nirbhaya atrocity was entirely responsible for my motivation in focusing upon
this case. The courage, passion, commitment, and tenacity of those
extraordinary men and women of India who poured out onto the streets to cry
"Enough is enough ", were so inspiring I felt I had to join these
voices by giving my energy and time to amplifying them with this documentary.
It occurred to me very strongly that no other
country in my lifetime had stood up so powerfully and for so long to fight for
womens’ rights, and here was India leading the world by example. I made the
film to address the global issue of violence against women and inspire other
countries to examine their own records and culpability in this respect. The
global statistics which punctuate the end of the film do not allow any viewer
off the hook - and as I travel the world as I have done since the
8th March, country by country, we screen the film and discuss that particular
country's record and culpability. Ironically, it is only India which sees
the film as 'about India" - the rest of the world see it as a focused
inquiry into global gender inequality and global violations of the human rights
of women and girls.
A film, as I know from years of experience as
a filmmaker HAS to be story specific, and that is why the Nirbhaya case was the
prism through which the issue was examined. Had those admirable and amazing
protests happened in any other country, in response to any other case that
illustrated the widespread patriarchal culture that limits and seeks to control
and, worse, violates, women the world over, I would have gone to that country
and made a film about the same issue but seen through the prism of that other
case...
Why
did you call your documentary India’s Daughter?
Since the victim cannot
be named by Indian law, she was known in the media as "Nirbhaya",
"Damini" AND "India's daughter". Since the film was always
intended to engender a GLOBAL Campaign, the most universal name offered up by
the Indian media here was "India's Daughter". And the case was world
renowned, so calling the film by the recognisable name the media had already
given to the heroic victim in this case made sense in order to ensure the
widest dissemination around the world.
Outside of India no one
knows what Damini or Nirbhaya mean, let alone are able to pronounce these
names. So this was a very innocent and logical choice made. I have since been
criticised - particularly by Indian feminists like Kavita Krishnan for using
"the language of patriarchy". I think this is petty, pedantic and a
distraction. And it is still surprises me that anyone who calls herself a
feminist can work against a documentary that is so clearly in the public
interest and in the interest of women by seeking to focus on minute criticisms
to discredit the film, and, worse still, should have called for the ban, as I
am reliably told the Indian feminists did. The word "daughter" is not
in the ownership of patriarchy. It describes the female child of parents, and,
in this case, the female child of a nation, and - by inference, the female
child of the world. Others around the world get this point: Meryl Streep at the
NY launch of the film on March 9th said: "We are all India's
Daughters". Only some in India ( a minority, I am happy to say, who seek
to reject the message of the film) have reacted with a knee-jerk reaction
taking the title literally and inferring that the film sought to 'shame' India.
Nothing could be further from the truth---the film sought to praise the Indian
civil society movement that protested with such inspiring vigour and to shine a
bright light on the abuse of the human rights of women and girls globally--
I have just been honoured with one of the most prestigious Human Rights Awards
in the world for my global work with this film for women's rights across the
world.
What
kind of research did you undertake?
Early research was
mostly bent on identifying the protagonists of the story and case - the direct
participants who would be important to interview. Compiling lists of these
people, addresses where their doors could be knocked on or they could be
contacted. I read everything i could find that had been written or reported
about the case in the media. I sat through several hours of archive material.
Wherever information
was lacking - eg about Nirbhaya herself, I undertook research amongst those who
knew her - a visit, for example, to her Physiotherapy Institute to do research
with students and teachers who were with her during her 4 years of study there.
Meeting her best friend, whose father and brother so control her that they
refused her permission to be interviewed. Many more people were interviewed and
much more material and information gathered than appears in the film. The film
is 1 hour long and the filmed interview material on the journey of making the
film is 87 hours long
I also interviewed
other rapists and read up about theories and inquiries into why men rape and
gang-rape, and generally treat women as disposal objects. And just identifying
the 150 odd questions I was to put to the 7 rapists I interviewed (4 from
other cases), was in itself a major research project.
What
was the message you were trying to convey?
The message of the film
emerges from the participants themselves - and emerged in the editing process
from insights gleaned through listening to their views and the reasons these
views are held. Often documentaries have a narrator who steer the audience and
'deliver' a message- you will note that there is NO narrator in this film, and
my voice is absent. Particularly because I am foreigner, and also because I
believe that a true inquiry with integrity should emerge from those directly
involved in the story, I was determined from the outset not to be a part of the
film and not to intrude my inevitably limited grasp on the culture and ground
realities surrounding the story. So the message emerges from the participants….
And
what is this message?
And the message in this film emerges with
blinding clarity. If you view women as of lesser value, if women are not as
welcome as boys, not deemed to be as worthy of education as boys, given half a
glass of milk, controlled as to where they are allowed to go, with whom, at
what time, and what they have to wear while doing so, are not deemed to be
autonomous and equal in practice (whatever the constitution of the country
says), then atrocities against them will take place.The film clearly shows that
there are enlightened men and women who withstand this 'programming' that is
thrust upon men and women by a controlling patriarchal society (Nirbhaya's
parents, Leila Seth, Sheila Dixit, Satendra, Amod Kanth, Gopal Subramanium, the
jail psychiatrist,...) and there are men and women who subscribe slavishly to
the patriarchal notions of what a woman is and how she is to be controlled by
men and is subordinate to men (the rapist, the lawyers, Akshay Thakur's
wife...).
There is a personal
choice to be made in any belief system. The message of the film also
encompasses the following insights: 1) that the so-called educated lawyers are
more shocking in their misogyny than the rapists, and therefore 'access to
education' is not relevant to the kind of dehumanising thinking they engage in,
quality
of education (what we learn) is the problem. 2) That the rapists are not
monsters or psychopaths, but ordinary 'normal' men who think as they do and
feel no remorse at all because they do not really believe they have done wrong,
when 'everybody's doing it", and since they have been programmed to view
women a certain way. Society and what we teach men has to take responsibility
for their thinking.
What
kind of interaction did you have with Nirbhaya’s parents…what
impressions did you gather from them about their daughter’s horrific
experience and the plight of women in general?
Her parents are
still utterly grief stricken. Because they are so enlightened, their daughter
was the centre of the family and the centre of their universe, even though they
had 2 sons. They all relied on her totally for advice, and believed she would
take care of the whole family on graduation. They are stuck in their grief
without the possibility of closure, as long as the case is stuck in the courts.
This was meant to be a fast-track case,
it seems it will take another 2-3 years to be heard there
as there is such a backlog of cases.
Despite this they are
dignified and wise beyond belief. They said so many important things
which didn't make it into the film because of time and focus constraints, like
:"we worship the goddesses, but in the home we treat our women like
footwear". Above all, they understand that their daughter's life has been
sacrificed for the good of humanity and that she has become a symbol and a
light which will hopefully help dispel the darkness of how women are viewed and
treated in the world. The family was very generously supportive of the film and
its message, though there were naturally great emotional difficulties in the
long filming hours in particular. When I was in Delhi, just at the time when
the shocking ban was anounced, Nirbhaya's father said to me: "When you
walk the right path, there will always be thorns, and there will always be
obstacles." I will always cherish these words ….
US premiere
There
were mixed reactions to the film--- some were very critical while
others welcomed your effort…what did you learn from them?
I learned how utterly
sad and disappointing it is that some people will put their own selfish
concerns about their 'image' above the objective of putting human rights
violations of their own women and girls first. I learned how utterly dangerous
it is to make snap judgements (banning the film without having even seen it). I
learned how cowardly people can be about 'stepping out of line' and demanding
truth and right and justice - though there are notable exceptions here: (Ketan
Dixit and NDTV), who are heroes and exceptions in having done so nonetheless. I
learnt how deep-seated and widespread resentment in India is against the
British legacy of colonialism : to the extent that they will spew out the word "gorri"
(as Jaya Bachchan did with such venom) But I also learned that there are
exceptional and good people everywhere in India who DO want change and are
willing to stand up and call for it, and
some who have been positively transformed by the film and have written to me to
say so. So both negative and positive lessons.
Following
the ban, did you feel that you were in that awkward intersection between
feminism and patriotism or, in this case, state pride?
Strangely enough I felt
I was trapped between feminism (or a certain group of Indian feminists) and
state pride as strange bedfellows on the one side, and truth-seekers and
change-makers on the other side. People who thought more about themselves and
their own selfish agenda on the one side, and those who thought more about
women and their rights on the other side.
Do
you feel Indian politicians reacted badly to a foreign depiction of India
because no matter how familiar the truth, governments hate to hear it spoken
from the outside?
I watched the
proceedings in the Lok Sabha on the morning after the ban and I have never been
more shocked: grown men and women, politicians on all sides of the house were
hysterical and unreasoning, screaming about tourism
being decimated and the image of India being tarnished around the
world. Again, there were 2 extraordinarily enlightened and dignified exceptions
here in Javed Akhtar and Anna Agu. And the supreme irony of the reaction of the
politicians is that the only shame that has been brought on India internally is
THE BAN itself.
As a woman who has been raped, and as a global citizen, I
stand firmly on my right to comment against abuses and violations of women's
human rights ANYWHERE in the world. I will not be silenced just because I do
not 'belong' to the country in which a particular atrocity takes place. It is
my right and my DUTY to speak out.
In
1927, Katherine Mayo wrote” Mother India” highlignting the issue of
child marriage/abuse which sparked off a huge controversy .Gandhi had
to despatch Cong leader Sarojini Naidu to the US to
clear the
air so that the freedom struggle would not be hampered….almost 9 decades later,
child marriage/abuse still exists in some areas….
This
is not a book I have read, and though it has been referred to a number of times
in relation the film, I have not had the time ,but as far as the continuing
prevalence of child marriage is concerned (and again, this is a GLOBAL
phenomenon which is tragically not limited to one country or even a handful of
them), I now believe (after my 2 years of work on the documentary) that child
marriage is just another symptom of the disease that is gender inequality.
Along with rape, acid attacks, trafficking, sex selection, and all other
violations of women and girls, these are the metastases, the spread of the
cancer, of the primary tumour that is the mind set of gender inequality.
Treating the symptoms makes us nurses putting plasters on wounds, whereas we
need to be surgeons and cut out the root cause - by changing the dominant
mind-set.
Do
you think the mindset has changed at all? Is the Indian woman truly liberated
in the 21 st century?
No. The mindset has not
changed to a marked enough degree, and generally women (with very few
exceptions) are not truly liberated in ANY country across the globe. It's only
a question of degree and of differing characteristics of inequality from
country to country. Women will not be truly liberated until they are allowed to
do everything men are allowed to do, until they earn equal pay for equal work,
until they are equally represented in corporations and parliaments across the
world, until they can move as they please and wear what they please without
being raped and blamed for it, until they are viewed and treated as equal to
men. Dr Ambedkar said "we measure the progress of society by the progress
of its women" - we have a long, long way to go.
What
is the perception of modern India’s woman in the West?
It's very hard to
generalise about this. There are narrow-minded people everywhere in the world
who will jump to conclusions because of having come across certain stereotypes
to do with 'coy' subservient images of Indian women that abound in Bollywood
films and advertising imagery, and knowing about arranged marriage and dowry
and certain cultural practices in India which suggest to them that Indian women
are encouraged to be wives rather than autonomous independent individuals..
The
positive messages in the film are many and varied and are working on audiences
the world over. It is only in India that the negative aspects and comments of
the rapists and their lawyers are so obsessively focused onto the absolute
exclusion of all that is positive in the film about India and Indian male and
female role models.
Despite
the ban here, your film was aired in several countries and at Cannes? What was
the reaction?
The reactions have been
overwhelmingly positive. We've screened in upward of 20 countries by now, and
at least 10 more planned in the next 2 months, and everywhere people are moved
to tears, enraged (mostly by the lawyers' comments) and immediately understand
that this is a global problem and are immediately ready to discuss their own
issues with women in their own countries. There is not one screening I have had
without people (men and women) coming up to me to offer themselves as
volunteers in the fight for women's rights. Activists have been 'born' as a
result of watching the film. The only negative comments there have been about the
ban.
You
have, in the past, worked with one of our finest actors,
Om Puri..Has he or any other Indian actor come
out in support of India’s Daughter?
Many Indian actors have
come out in support of the film: Farhan Akhtar, Nandita Das, John Abraham and
others. What surprises, in fact shocks, me greatly is that no concerted action
or even loud voices have been heard in demanding this counter-productive and
damaging ban be lifted. I often wonder where the impassioned and highly
civilised voices of the protesters are now. Why are they silent? Wrong
will triumph as long as good men and women do and say nothing.
What
are your future projects?
I have plans to produce
a feature film (which pre-date this documentary) and I will see that through
but I will make no other films. Instead I am dedicating my life 24/7 to
travelling the world and amplifying the message of the documentary in
campaigning for meaningful changes for women and girls. And, specifically, I am
advising the UN Human Rights Office on a global education campaign which we are
encouraging education ministers around the world to adopt to add equality
education, moral values and ethics ("life skills") to numeracy and
literacy in early years education.
I was recently at the
Commonwealth education conference in the Bahamas, meeting with education
ministers from the commonwealth and getting incredibly positive and
enthusiastic responses to co-opting the initiative. Sadly, the Indian education
minister, Ms Irani, refused to even discuss it with me..I can only pray that
the Delhi High Court judge who is to make a decision on the legal status of the
ban on 5th August, will make a wise and independent decision, and that the ban
will be lifted and we can put this counter-productive feud behind.
Leslee took two years to finish the
documentary, hoping that the result will help people open their eyes towards
this mindset. The contrary opinions are that it may suggest the poisonous
mindsets of the convicts to many men.
The debate continues amidst media channels
in India and even among feminist intellectuals whether such people deserve a
platform and freedom of expression. On the other side, another debate prolongs
whether airing the documentary is good or bad for the country.
