Vivek (Reason) [2018]

 The English title for Anand Patwardhan’s searing and sprawling political documentary Vivek – made over 4 years, clocking a colossal 4 hours and 20 minutes (making this his magnum opus), and alternating between unsettling street reportage, fearless investigative journalism, exposés on religious majoritarianism and political extremism, scorching inquiries into toxic social fault-lines, and a no-holds-barred expression of dissent – is ‘Reason’. The closer translation of the word, however, is ‘Conscience’. The two incidentally formed the dual pillars on which Patwardhan constructed this blistering exercise that, unsurprisingly, faced significant censorship hurdles, and which the director managed to circumvent through canny bending of procedural guidelines. Divided into eight chapters that touched upon multiple interconnected topics informing the dismantling of contemporary India’s secular and pluralistic fabric with brazen impunity – thereby giving it the form of an epic and wide-ranging non-fiction book shaped by harsh objective truths and ironic authorial observations – it began with the murders of anti-superstition advocate Narendra Dabholkar and Communist social activist Govind Pansare, for their outspoken public campaigns against blind beliefs and medieval religious practices. It then branched into targeted violence, systemic persecution and extrajudicial vigilantism against any person or community considered antithetical to right-wing political forces and majoritarian religious and caste demographics – covering mob lynchings of Muslims; Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula’s death; shadowy supremacist and ultra-nationalist organizations with fascist agendas; the conspiracy surrounding ATS chief Hemant Karkare’s death; and massive agitations by the freethinking left-wing students of JNU, led by Kanhaiya Kumar and Umar Khalid. The dominant emotions that ran through the vast canvas of this defiantly pugnacious and confrontational work – which ended with journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh’s murder, thus bringing the film a full circle – were rage, angst and lamentation.

Director: Anand Patwardhan

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film/Investigative Reportage/Political Documentary

Language: Hindi/Marathi/English

Country: India