Winds of change

Indian filmmaker Ashish Srivastav’s Flames Of The Snow is the first documentary that has got a commercial release in 42 theatres across Nepal.

New Delhi-based documentary filmmaker Ashish Srivastav always nurtured a desire to tell a story that was never told before. His wish got fulfilled when he met Indian journalist Anand Swaroop Verma who had been closely following the people’s struggle against monarchy and feudal oppression in Nepal since many years. Srivastav got enthused to make a documentary on how people got together to dismantle the monarchy and establish the republic. He started doing research on the subject and finally went to Nepal in 2006 to interview various members of the Nepal Maoist party and the People’s Liberation Army. He says, “Whatever has been published in the media till date had been from the state’s point of view who were the powerful side in the revolution. My documentary does not give a verdict but tells people what happened on the other side of the fence.”

Today five years down the line, Srivastav is a happy man as his hard work has paid off and his Flames Of The Snow is the first documentary that has got a commercial release in 42 theatres across Nepal.

The film that hit the theatres on February 17 has been produced by India’s Third World Media in collaboration with Nepal’s Group For International Solidarity and traces the long pro-democracy struggle against three regimes: the Shah Kings of Nepal who ruled the country for 240 years, the repressive Rana Prime Ministers who reduced the kings to puppets for 104 years and a succession of 12 governments in 13 years who sought to put down people’s protests by force. The film focusses on two issues — the significance of the Nepalese revolution in the world today and the conspiracy by the United States and other imperialist countries to thwart this revolution.

The documentary starts off with the murders of the king, queen and eight more royals in June 2001 and ends in 2008 when an elected parliament abolished monarchy and ordered the deposed king to vacate the palace so that it could become a national museum. Srivastav, who travelled extensively to meet people associated with the struggle, says, “These individuals are dangerous for the enemies, not for us. We arranged interviews with the top leader of Nepal’s Maoist party — Chairman and former Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda and his deputy Baburam Bhattarai and went to most of the camps. I was surprised to see so many lady commandos.”

Despite extensive research, Srivastav was not prepared for the wide-ranging effect that the revolution had on the lives of people of Nepal. He says, “I was amazed to see how right from the bell boy of our hotel to the party leader everyone spoke about the revolution. The ideology had a ripple effect. Challenging the might of the state through a self-sustained revolution is quite a miracle. They snatched arms from the police, kidnapped the landlords and funded their war.”

The filmmaker was also clear that he didn’t want to give a balanced view in his work. “The problem is that all of us are used to watching movies that give a balanced view about everything. But I think we tend to lose focus. I’m not an activist, I’m just a filmmaker who wanted to present facts.”

The two hour five minute long film also ran into problems with the Censor Board. While the Nepal Censor Board asked Srivastav to remove two scenes where the US flag was shown burning, the Indian authorities were apprehensive that the film would trigger a revolution here. But the filmmaker and the producer managed to convince them after corresponding with them regularly.

Srivastav is happy that his work is now being screened in theatres along with other main stream films and has elicited a good response. He held the first screening at the Russian Cultural Centre in Nepal where a distributor was supposed to watch it and give his go-ahead for the project. But he couldn’t turn up for the screening. Later the director invited him to his hotel. Srivastav says, “He saw the potential and agreed to distribute it. But due to the political scenario in Nepal, we couldn’t release it then. Now that things have settled down this is the right time.”

Srivastav is hopeful that his film will be released in India and says, “There is a bigger market here than Nepal.” But ask him what has he learnt from The Flames Of The Snow and he confesses, “I have realised that documentaries have to be a completely designed project where you need a proper financier and distributor, otherwise it becomes difficult to market the product. I love making documentaries but at the end of the day they take a lot of time.”