A number of
carefully conceptualised events, with partners
from academia and media, are taking the
message of UK’s leadership in the
field of environment science, management
and research to key constituencies in India.
We list here some key events.
Wildscreen Festival
India 2007
UK Environment Film Fellowships 2006
Premiere of award winning
films
Wildscreen Festival India
January 2007
Wildscreen Festival India: For the first
time ever, the world’s largest and
most prestigious wildlife and environmental
film festival is coming to Indian in January
2007. This festival is scheduled to be held
across all regions of India - North, East,
West and South.
[Read more]
International Conference
on Meso Scale Processes In Atmosphere, Ocean
And Environmental Systems
New Delhi
UK
Environment Film Fellowships 2006
Wildlife crime
is an issue of grave concern for all of
us today and India is home to thousands
of such rare flora and fauna including the
tiger, the sloth bear and the musk deer
amongst many other endangered species.
In our efforts to play an active role in
helping to sustain this rich diversity we
had offered 7 fellowships worth INR 6 lacs
each to enterprising filmmakers who document
these challenges. Today we are proud to
announce the winners of the UK Environment
Film Fellowships for 2006 on wildlife crime.
They are as follows:
Sonya V. Kapoor - Once
there was a purple butterfly
The proposed film focuses on the extinction
of butterflies in the Indian subcontinent
and cites the instance of the Purple Emperor
butterfly.
Gurmeet Sapal - Killers
of the King
The proposed film aims to capture the beauty
and vulnerability of leopards; their threatening,
as well as, threatened existence in the
hills of Uttaranchal.
Himanshu Malhotra –
Vanishing Seas
The film intends to deal with the unexplored
world of marine trade which is depleting
our seas, endangering our waters and destroying
our habitat.
Jay Mazoomdaar –
The Hunted
The story of the film aims to address the
tiger trade by disengaging the forest-dwelling
hunter and offering them viable livelihood
options.
Kalpana Subramanian
- Turtles in a soup
The film will focus on turtle poaching and
trade in the Gangetic river basin and Kolkata
markets.
Ashima Narain - The
Last Dance
The story of the film focuses
on the poaching and trade of the Indian
Sloth bear. The story intends to highlight
the intricate poaching syndicate within
India and across its borders.
P.Balan & R. Radha - The Silenced
Witness
The story centres around crimes committed
on Elephants in Kerala - both domesticated
and wild.
Click here for full story details.
All of the above films are scheduled to
be completed by December 2006 and will be
aired on Discovery Channel and screened
at the Wildscreen Festival in India to be
held in January 2007.
Sonya V. Kapoor - Once there was
a purple butterfly
Sonya has done her Mass Communications from
MCRC, Jamia and MBA from IMI, Delhi. Presently
she is freelancing, directing documentaries.
She has worked for all genres of television
from news and soaps to lifestyle and game
shows. She has worked for Star TV, Zee TV,
Channel V, television 18, Freemantle productions
and has done freelance work for National
Geographic as well.
The film is just not about depletion of
forests or they being pollinators but of
crimes against them which include ornaments,
key chains, pen stands being made out of
them and sold for as less as Rs. 18. They
are being used as decorations internationally
for wedding and other events. They are being
put in matchboxes and sent out of India
dead or alive for private collectors. They
are also being encased in molten acrylic
for beautification. We need to highlight
this.
Of the thousands of butterfly species in
India, less than a thousand remain while
almost a hundred species are on the brink
of extinction. A fall in the population
of butterflies means a decrease in the number
of their predators, and an increase for
their prey. Butterflies are the second largest
pollinators in the world after honeybees.
As the population of butterfly's decline,
so too will the agriculture industry. This
has actually happened in the US. While most
butterflies thrive in tropical forests,
many species suffer from the depletion of
forest cover. And that's not all. The plants
they fed on have become extinct along with
the butterflies.
Gurmeet Sapal - Killers of the
King
Gurmeet is director-cameraperson specializing
in filming on various video and film formats.
He has been working professionally for the
last eight years for various International
and National TV channels and corporate houses.
His forte lies in filming people, corporate
films, natural history and difficult high-stress
situations. His debut film 'Chasing Butterflies'
won the prestigious 'Vatavarn-2002' in the
wildlife film category.
The proposed film aims to capture the beauty
and vulnerability of leopards; their threatening,
as well as, threatened existence in the
hills of Uttaranchal. It will focus on the
harsh reality that crime against leopards
is not just limited to professional poachers.
In fact, common village folks are larger
perpetrators of crimes against leopards.
The film aims to highlight the role being
played by state-of-the-art technologies
and scientific developments in combating
wildlife crime.
Himanshu Malhotra - Vanishing Seas
Producer, Director and Cameraperson - Himanshu
Malhotra, has completed his Masters in Mass
Communication from the first batch of York
University - Mass Communication Research
Centre, Jamia at Delhi. His film on Animal
rights ‘Are we so insensitive to life?!’
exposed the inhuman torture subject to animals
in India. This film was the first of its
kind and was taken as evidence in various
court rulings for reforms in favour of animal
rights in India. His footage on circus animals
was used in the campaign to ban the use
of animals in circuses in India and was
part of a film done by the BBC. He has designed
print and audio-visual campaigns on animal
rights for the Animal Welfare Board of India.
His current production, ‘Seasons in
the Sun’, a film on Keoladeo National
Park for the World Wide Fund for Nature
was used for the inauguration of the Dr
Salim Ali Interpretation Centre at Bharatpur
in January 2006. Himanshu has also made
a short film ‘Return to the wild’
which documents the capture and release
of a young tigress, inspite of a hostile
situation thus giving an incentive to the
conservation programme in the Sundarbans
area. His documentary on Siberian Cranes
has been shown at the Ramsar Convention
in Moscow (International Conference on saving
the Siberian Crane) and is the only documentation
of the Siberian Project in India. The film
‘Flight to Discovery’ on Bird
Sanctuaries of Uttar Pradesh was screened
at Vatavaran 2002, and the Tourism festival
at Milan.
The proposed 15 minute film ‘Vanishing
Seas’ will deal with the unexplored
world of marine trade, a wildlife crime
which most people are unaware of. It is
this world of marine trade, which is depleting
our seas, endangering our waters and destroying
our habitat. Many laws exist, but implementation
is difficult. The lack of awareness has
made many people participate in this crime
sometimes as tourist, sometimes as keen
aquarists. The proposed film will look at
wildlife crime through its effects on coastal
areas, how an invisible trade continues
supported by tourism and a big commercial
industry, and how interventions are difficult.
The film will use the Andaman and Nicobar
islands as an example to address some of
the issues of marine trade.
Jay Mazoomdaar - The Hunted
Apart from working as a Senior Assistant
Editor with The Indian Express, Jay focuses
on wildlife and trade-related issues. In
January 2005 he broke the Sariska story
and in February, broke similar stories from
Ranthambhore and Panna. In the following
months, Jay was the first to report the
conservation crisis from nine tiger reserves,
including conflict zones like Indravati,
Palamu and Valmiki. Taking note of these
reports, the Prime Minister set up the tiger
task force and the Supreme Court engaged
the CBI to investigate the cases of tiger
poaching. Jay has actively helped many national
and international film-projects including
CBS and Riverbanks.
The tiger trade can obviously be tackled
at both ends: by reducing the demand and
also the supply. Enforcement and awareness
drives will come handy for both. But one
initiative that can most significantly reduce
the risk is disengaging the forest-dwelling
hunter. Without him, it will be virtually
impossible for the city-based kingpins to
poach tigers. And for that, other than vigilance,
we need a realistic approach that offers
these hunters viable livelihood options.
Government initiatives apart, private participation
in such ventures can go a long way in achieving
that goal.
Kalpana Subramanian - Turtles
in a soup
Kalpana Subramanian graduated from the National
Institute of Design in 2000, specializing
in Film and Video Communication. She was
member of a multidisciplinary team that
won the International Audi Design Award
1996 for a design project for street children.
She has been a core team member of the Sacred
World Research Laboratory, an interactive
media lab, developed by Ranjit Makkuni.
She was a filmmaker with SWRL on The Crossing
Project - A Multimedia Experience of Banaras,
(Winner of the ID International Review Award
and Prix Ars Electronica 2002). Her short
experimental film The Maze of Lanes, also
made for this exhibit, was showcased at
many international festivals including the
Yamagata Documentary Film Festival 2003.
She has directed several short films for
The Eternal Gandhi Museum, one of the world's
first digital multimedia museums. Her work
includes experimental, documentary, educational
and promotional films. She currently directs
and edits independant films at her studio
Shoot at Sight, New Delhi.
Turtles in a Soup is a film on the illegal
trade of freshwater turtles in India, and
the escalating threat to the survival of
these species due to their commercial exploitation.
Turtles have inhabited the earth for over
200 million years. Today, more than half
of the world's turtle species face possible
extinction. Non-sustainable commercial exploitation
by man, is threatening to eliminate the
last remaining species forever. India has
one of the most diverse chelonian faunas
in the world and the conservation of these
species need to be re-examined in the context
of wildlife crime. Today turtles are being
collected, butchered, eaten, traded, sold,
and exploited in overwhelming numbers, in
India and across Asia. This film brings
to light the illegal trade of freshwater
turtles and tortoises in India with relevance
to the Asian Turtle Crisis.
Ashima Narain - The Last Dance
Ashima completed her BA (Honours) in History
from Mumbai, after which she attended the
Surrey Institute of Art & Design for
a BA in photography. She has exhibited her
work in Helsinki, Munich, Muscat, Mumbai,
Goa and New Delhi. In 2004, she won the
Commonwealth Photographer of the Year for
Asia. She was the principal photographer
for Man's World, India's leading men's lifestyle
magazine. Ashima has also shot for several
film posters and researched and directed
the first ever documentary on the flamingos
in Mumbai titled ' In the Pink'.
One motivation for choosing the subject
of poaching and trade of the Indian Sloth
bear for the theme of Wildlife Crime is
that this bear enjoys the same rank of protection
as the tiger under the law, and yet crimes
and cruelty are blatantly committed upon
this animal all across India. Through the
story of a single dancing bear, we highlight
the multiple crimes that remain in perpetuity,
and the unfortunate truth that often a dead
bear has more value than a living one. Monetary
gains range from INR 3000 for selling a
young cub to a bear dancer to INR 20,000
for sending an adult bear's gall bladder
to South Asia.
P.Balan & R. Radha - The Silenced
Witness
P.Balan has been active for more than 15
years in the field of Radio and Video/Film
production .His work has been widely recognised
at National and International levels with
several awards to his credit. His third
film 'The 18th Elephant -3 Monologues' ,has
won seven major awards including three National
Awards for Film [Non-Feature] and the Panda
Award, Wildscreen, U.K, 2004.
P.Balan is also the founder -member of the
ANMPU Media Trust [Acronym for 'Alternate
network of Media People']which is a non-profit
organisation based in Kochi, Kerala that
consists of like -minded people from different
walks of Life who are interested in the
creative exploration of media.
Ecology, Culture & Lifestyle, Health,
Education, Gender etc form ANMPU's various
spheres of concern.
The subject of the proposed film is to relate
the concept of wild life crime with elephants
in Kerala - both domesticated and wild.
There have been comprehensive legislations
protecting the elephant in India, which
are being broken with impunity. It is important
that in a land like Kerala dominated by
anthropocentric elephant stories that our
treatment of elephants, recognised as one
of the ‘most protected species’
and protected by schedule 1 of CITES [Convention
on International Trade in Endangered Species
of Wild Flora and Fauna] be reviewed in
the framework of a ‘Wildlife Crime’.
Premiere of award winning films
- UK Environment Film Fellowships 2005
5 June 2006, New Delhi
The event also
showcases four well-researched documentaries,
as part of the UK Environment Film Fellowships
2005, announced last year on the ‘Impacts
of Climate Change in India’. These
four films have been made into a one hour
long programme with a foreword by Sir Mark
Tully and will be premiered on Discovery
Channel on June 5th 2006 at 8 PM.
 |
A
Green Agony- a film about the Sunderbans
by Geeta Singh |
|
|
Climate’s
First Orphans - film about the coastal
districts of |
| |
Orissa
ravaged by repeated cyclones and threatened
by rising sea levels; by Nila Madhab
Panda |
|
|
A Degree of Concern - film by Syed Fayaz
about melting |
| |
glaciers
in Ladakh |
|
|
The
Weeping Apple Tree - film on effects
of climate change |
| |
on
agriculture in Himachal Pradesh; by
Vijay S Jodha |
|
|
Foreword
by Sir Mark Tully |
[Archive]
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