CHENNAI: There is grief and agony in Palani Kumar’s voice when he says that Tamil Nadu has accounted for the most number of manual scavenging deaths in the nation in the past five years. Every time he is present in a funeral to photograph and document the death of a sanitary worker in the state, he stands with pain, dubiety and sometimes numbness, not knowing what difference it makes, if any, to the lives of these people. Yet, he continues to capture such moments and the turmoil faced by sanitary workers with his camera, to throw spotlight on the discrimination they face on a daily basis, hoping for a change.
The 27-year-old Madurai-based lensman has organised and participated in about 12 photo exhibitions held in different parts of the country.
“Photographing sanitary workers isn’t new; there have been people who have clicked numerous photos about their lives two or three decades back. Those photos depict the unimaginable distress that their routines were filled with. Even today, nothing has changed and the story remains the same, with the soreness and sorrow of the next generation being passed on to the cameras of photographers like me,” he says.
By documenting manual scavenging, Palani says, if he is able to bring about a minor change in the lives of the children of these sanitary workers, he will consider himself a successful photographer. “In 2016, when I was introduced to Divya Bharathi and worked as a cinematographer for her popular documentary Kakkoos, I started understanding how sanitary workers were ill-treated in society. The work for the movie went on for about a year in different cities and I even went around doing shoots on my own, sometimes. Despite getting sick multiple times during the stint, I continued shooting. It was an experience like never before and inspired me to follow their lives, even after the movie was released. Since then, I have continued to take impactful photos that depict the dark side of their lives,” he shares.
Born to parents who sold fish to earn their daily bread, Palani’s story towards glory is an inspiring one in itself. His fascination towards camera and films began when he was in class 10. “When I saw the first movie in the Spiderman series in which the hero is a camera man, I was fascinated by it. Later when I joined college to pursue Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering, I managed to save money from my hostel fees to buy my first camera, Nikon 5100. My dream was fulfilled. It made me popular in college; I used to click whatever I found appealing. With the support of my friends, I also released my first short film, BE, during our departmental annual function in 2014. Guna sir, a well-wishers, also helped me organise an exhibition of my photos at the college the same year,” he says.
After graduating from college, Palani travelled with a team called ‘Kaliman Viralgal’ visiting government schools in tribal areas and conducted different kinds of workshops there. He continues to travel and is a full-time photographer who clicks photos with a social consciousness. He is also part of PEP Collective, a group of photographers who shoot for the wellness of environment and peace.