Pratyaya Saha on 1924 – Kakori Project: ‘How children become casualties of political conflicts’

Still from the film Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

The ninth short film by Bengaluru-based independent filmmaker, Pratyaya Saha, 1924 – Kakori ProjectIt had its international premiere at the closing night of the Big Apple Film Festival in New York on 12 December.

“The Big Apple Film Festival is one of America’s premier film festivals in the independent film circuit,” says Suffolk on the call from Whitefield. “They have a platform for shorts, feature films and screenplays. we are thrilled with 1924 – Kakori Project Was selected for screening at the festival. One of our producers, Anshulika Kapoor, represented us in New York.”

Many of Pratyaya’s films have been screened at international film festivals and have won awards. His just another day (2021) won the Best Short Film Award against Violence Against Women in Türkiye, I am Mahmood (2022) won Best Short Film at the Kolkata International Film Festival and Best Cinematography at the Jaipur International Film Festival.

The challenges for short filmmakers are innumerable, says Pratyaya, who believes that film festivals are the perfect platform to showcase short films. “Short films are not released in theatres. Even streaming services don’t take shorts. We have limited ways to display our work. The most we can do is upload to YouTube or Vimeo.”

Writer-Director, Pratyay Saha Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

Prataya says that’s where festivals like the Big Apple Film Festival come in to fill the gap. “They are great launch pads for filmmakers like us, because we don’t have any platforms for shorts. In such film festivals, we get an engaged audience, who not only watches the film but also interacts with us.

suffix shares that 1924 – Kakori Project was nominated for the Best Short Film Award. Big platforms also open doors for distributors around the world, Pratyaya says. “Festivals like this come as a light at the end of the tunnel and are game changers for us.”

Shorts are performing better today than they did five years ago. “Feature films have now reduced their length from 140 minutes to 80 to 90 minutes. Even shows that previously had one-hour episodes have been reduced to 25 minutes. The attention span of people has narrowed and shorts will get a chance to earn money in the future.

Set against India’s freedom struggle, 1924 – Kakori Project Explores the trauma of children in conflict, dealing with moral dilemmas that still resonate today. The film, in Bengali and Hindi, is set in the winter of 1924 when a young man is recruited for a covert operation. He grapples with the moral complexities of the Indian freedom struggle, juxtaposed with the dire plight of children trapped in conflict zones.

“In 1925, a group of nationalists took over a train at Kakori, near Lucknow,” says Pratyaya. “They captured some of the wealth that the British were looting from India. This caused an uproar and was a major turning point in the Indian freedom struggle. Forty people were hanged for this.”

The suffix states that the film is a fictional account of this incident. “The story takes place a year before the Kakori incident, when people were being recruited. The film explores how children become casualties of political conflicts.

Pratyaya says he is considering expanding the short film into a full feature film. “The short film screened at the festival also becomes a potential pitch to interested investors and distributors.”

Anshulika Kapoor, a producer of the film, at the festival in New York. Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

Pratyaya says, there are a lot of stories in India which are multicultural in nature. “It would take a filmmaker a lifetime to cover one percent of these stories. I try to choose stories which have not been picked up by the mainstream media and which have their own history and legacy.”

Pratyaya wrote the script 1924 – Kakori ProjectWhich was shot in the ghats of Kolkata. “This is where the revolutionaries held secret meetings. We specifically looked for authentic places untouched by globalization. Since we worked with a small budget and couldn’t create a 1920s-looking location with VFX, we were determined to find real locations that matched the past.

Produced by Purva Bhatt, Vijaykumar Mirchandani (executive producer), Manish Verma and Anshulika (associate producer). 1924 – Kakori Project It will premiere at the Nepal Human Rights International Film Festival later this month, run by the United Nations Development Programme.