"South Asia and the Himalayas in pictures and debate" cycle 2024-2025

4 September 2024

Culture
CESSMA
Campus life

Inalco's South Asia and Himalayas department and CESSMA (India/Nepal group) are organizing a series of film and documentary events to shed light on current events in the region and its diasporas through images and debate. Specialists will discuss topics as varied as the migration path of the Bangladeshis, agro-ecology in India, the struggle for survival in rural India, and learning about democracy in Bhutan. The free screenings are open to all, with no need to book, and there will be plenty of opportunity for discussion afterwards.

Un groupe d'homme se tient debout, ils sont vêtus de turbans colorés et de grands châles par dessus une tenue traditionnelle — Les villageois © Singh‎

Programming 2024-2025

Session 1 - Bangladesh in images and debate: meeting Bangladeshi migrants

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13th) - Auditorium

The Game, directed by Joy Banerjee and Prokash Roy, 2023 l 43 min l VOST l French

Their names are Mohamed, Abdullah, Ujjal...They all left Bangladesh one day for Europe, hoping for a better life. Some of them have succeeded in settling in Paris, even though they are undocumented. Others were not so lucky, and tell of the ordeal they endured in Libya, trapped by their smugglers. In France, the immigration debate is raging. The film, shot in the Sylet region of Bangladesh and in Paris, gives a face to these Bangladeshi migrants.

Debate in the presence of Philippe Benoit, Bengal specialist (Inalco-Cerlom) and in the presence of the directors.

Session 2 - India in images and debate: Agroecology in India

Wednesday, October 23, 2024 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13th) - Auditorium

The Indian soil in revolution by Renuka George, 2023 l 55 min

In 2015, with the support of the Andhra Pradesh state government in India, senior civil servant T. Vijay Kumar introduced natural agriculture on a large scale. The aim: to convert 6 million farmers to chemical-free agriculture. Through encounters with farmers and with T. Vijay Kumar, this film is an insight into the success of these new methods and the vision behind the world's largest agroecological transition experiment.

Debate with Annie Montaut, professor emeritus of Hindi (Inalco), author of Trois mille ans d'écologie indienne : penser autrement la nature(Le Seuil, 2024) and in the presence of the director.

Session 3 - India in images and debate: fighting social injustice

Wednesday December 18, 2024 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13th) - Auditorium

Alms for the Blind Horse by Gurvinder Singh, 2011 l 1h52 min l VOST l English

A family wakes up to the news that a house on the outskirts of their village has just been demolished. The indignant father joins the rest of the small community in demanding justice. On the same day, his son Melu, a rickshaw driver, goes on strike alongside his union.

Debate in the presence of Marie-Caroline Saglio, anthropologist specializing in India (Inalco/CESSMA) and Nicolas Jaoul, anthropologist, specializing in India (CNRS/IRIS).

Session 4 - India in images and debate: reincarnations and ghost hunting

Wednesday, February 12, 2025 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13e) - Auditorium

Black Hole. Why I have never been a Rose d'Emmanuel Grimaud and Arnaud Deshayes

In Calcutta, patients explore their past lives in a hypnotist's office and find themselves propelled into the remotest folds of the past. Meanwhile, a group of ghost hunters investigate the abandoned sites of colonial history and attempt to communicate with wandering souls via their radio sets. Black Hole oscillates between mediumistic device and ghost trap, tracking the strange paths of reincarnation, right up to the short circuit.

Debate with the two directors, Emmanuel Grimaud, anthropologist at the Laboratory of Ethnology and Comparative Sociology (CNRS) and Arnaud Deshayes, and Marie-Caroline Saglio, anthropologist specializing in India (Inalco/CESSMA).

Session 5 - Bhutan in image and debate: learning democracy

Wednesday, March 12, 2025 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13e) - Auditorium

The Monk and the Gun by Pawo Chyning Dorji, 2024 l 1h47 min l VOST l French

2006. Bhutan opens up to modernization and discovers the Internet, television... and democracy. To teach its people how to vote, the government organizes "white elections". But in the land of Gross National Happiness, where religion and the King are more important than politics, the inhabitants seem unmotivated. However, in a remote mountain province, a monk decides to organize a mysterious ceremony on voting day and instructs one of his disciples to find a rifle...

Debate with Jeanne Mascolo, journalist and documentary filmmaker (to be confirmed) and Nicolas Silhet (CESAH), anthropologist specializing in Tibetan Buddhism.

Session 6 - India in images and debate: rural India in times of pandemic

Wednesday April 9, 2024 - 6pm-9pm - PLC (Paris 13th) - Auditorium

One side of the road, by Jalil Nordman, 2024 l 86 min l English and Tamil, French subtitles

Between 2019 and 2022, on a road running through a rural locality in Tamil Nadu (South India), four dalits from the same village describe their daily lives through intimate and rare testimonies, which form a life journey around three extraordinary years marked by an international pandemic and its harsh economic and social consequences in rural India.

Debate with Anne Viguier, historian specializing in South India (Inalco-CESSMA) and Cécile Mouchel (CESSMA), in the presence of director Jalil Nordman (IRD, LEDa-DIAL).