Renukaji in Delhi's taps
Kurush Canteenwalla’s documentary made as part of the Infochange Media Fellowship 2009 starts in thirsty Delhi and travels to the lush, green Renuka valley in Himachal Pradesh where families in 17 panchayats will be thrown off their fertile picture-postcard land to make way for the Renuka dam that will supply water to Delhi. Those living in the area –mostly farmers - point to the many crops they grow and from which they make a decent living, and ask what they can do and where they can go when their land is taken away. The documentary highlights the powerlessness of ordinary people in a democracy and skewed city development that has destroyed Delhi’s own water resources and causes it to prey on the resources of people 300 miles away.

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Rebuilding Lives
A CCDS documentary, made by Jeeva Jayadas as part of the Infochange Media Fellowship 2008, finds out how survivors of the tsunami are picking up the pieces of their lives four years after the 2004 disaster that left over 10,000 dead in India. Jeeva travels with her camera through Nagapattinam, the worst-affected district in Tamil Nadu, and coastal Kerala.

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Waste
Santosh, Sameer and Salman – three real-life 'slumdogs' - live in Dharavi, Mumbai’s biggest slum. They are among thousands of child ragpickers in the city, making a vital contribution to Mumbai’s recycling industry, based largely in Dharavi. The boys comb through mountains of rubbish on the outskirts of the Indian metropolis that generates 8,000 metric tonnes of waste every day. They have no protection against the dangerous toxins that surround them. But for them, they say, waste is gold. Who recognises the value of their contribution to waste management in the city? What will happen to them and to the waste recycling industry of Dharavi when the slum redevelopment plan ousts them from here? Parasher Baruah won the Infochange Media Fellowship 2008 to make this film.

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Sangha Majha Bapala (Tell My Father)
CCDS presents its latest documentary film, directed by Soumitra Bhattacharya, on the child rights movement building up in more than 60 villages in Latur district of Maharashtra. These are drought-prone villages from where dalit labour migrate to the lush green sugarcane fields of western Maharashtra. Often, the dalits take their children with them to work the fields. But not any more. Now the children are demanding that they be allowed to go to school. They are asking why the entitled scholarships are not being granted to them, why they cannot eat the midday meal alongside the rest of the children.

Soumitra Bhattacharya was awarded the Infochange Media Fellowship 2008 to make this film. Watch video

VOX POP
Get the message across!
The Vox Pop project uses the short-film format to show up – and bridge -- the borders between people, cultures, classes, genders, nations, ideologies, religions We’ve made the first in the series

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You make the rest!
Films should explore the broad theme of BORDERS. Read details

Goa, Goa, Gone
Mining is Goa’s second-largest industry after tourism. 8% of this state’s land is already under mining, mostly for iron ore. Now, mining activity is intensifying across the state. So is the opposition of citizens to this unregulated industry. This Infochange documentary explores the impact of mining on Goa’s environment – one of the world’s 12 biodiversity hotspots -- and livelihoods