Much has been said, documented, and theorised about the relationship between the centre and the periphery; both theory and practice shed clarity on the exploitative nature between the two, where the glitter of the centre attracts and in turn exploits, labour and resources from the periphery. The average migrant labourer in Bengaluru, like one in any other such ‘centre’ of capital, is promised dignity for their labour, only to be left defenseless in the wake of the ruling class’ exploits. Photo, Utsav Gonwar’s directorial debut, which was recently screened at the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, Bengaluru City Campus, uses this context to weave its tale of pathos.
Set against the backdrop of Raichur in Kalyana-Karnataka, the film follows 10-year-old Durgya, who dreams of visiting Bengaluru during his school vacation to get a photograph in front of the iconic Vidhana Soudha. Unbeknownst to him or his mother, who is swayed by his passion to send him to his father who works as a labourer in Bengaluru, the Covid-19 pandemic and the ensuing lockdown loom over their heads. The film is held aflame by Durgya’s singular desire to click a photograph in front of Vidhana Soudha, and many outside Karnataka (or even within it) might wonder why. As Gonwar explains, “I come from Raichur, which lies in the Hyderabad-Karnataka region. Taking a photo in front of Vidhana Soudha and hanging it on the wall – it is a very normal thing in our area. It’s like dignity; I didn’t create it.”
Due to the nationwide lockdown, Durgya’s dream remains unfulfilled. Soon after reaching Bengaluru, he and his father are forced out of the city on a journey towards their village, leaving the child feeling parched and betrayed. The unfulfilment of his dream, of course, underscores the inaccessibility the centre enforces upon the periphery; Vidhana Soudha, as a symbol of the consolidated power of the centre, remains ever-elusive, not just in terms of literal distance, but also institutional access. “Politically speaking, it’s symbolic in the sense that the kind of access that people in Bengaluru might have to Vidhana Soudha is far and distant for us,” asserts Gonwar.
Photo is keen and unrelenting in its realism, never shirking away from levying criticism towards the kind of privileged ignorance and apathy that many were subjected to during the pandemic. It is easy to discern a tempered rage operating within the film. Gonwar, who wrote the script during the pandemic and shot the film in 2022, displaces this anger from himself, to his community. “It is a natural reaction to the situation. If it comes across as rage, it represents the collective rage that the people from the region felt. I started writing the script when Gangamma, a pregnant woman, who had to walk from Bengaluru to Raichur, died on the way,” he says.
The resistance faced by Durgya in the pursuit of his dream is shared by Gonwar’s own experience in the city. The filmmaker, who quit formal education at the PUC level after a wrist fracture, shares that his identity, like many different identities and dialects in the broad region surrounding Raichur, is reduced and homogenised under the ‘North Karnataka’ umbrella. “Whenever I am travelling in an autorickshaw, if I talk on the phone with my family, the driver will say, ‘North Karnataka, right?’ They consider you an outsider. It’s because of the accent – but within it, are multiple dialects and cultures,” Gonwar explains.