Bharatbala’s ‘Uthenge Hum’ captures lockdown in India

Mumbai, June 5  Filmmaker Bharatbala, who had collaborated with AR Rahman on the iconic song “Vande Mataram”, has captured the silence following the lockdown in India, in his latest project “Uthenge Hum”.

On March 25, Bharatbala and a team of 117 set out to document this unprecedented time. The outcome is “Uthenge Hum”.

“When something unprecedented like this is unfolded in India, as a creative filmmaker I couldn’t sit silent. I wanted to document this time that 1.3 billion people were experiencing something different for the first time. When people are locked inside their homes, how do they know what is going on outside? I wanted to capture this collective experience and emotion so that we have it in our memory for generations to come. This is something the most positive thing we have seen and created; it gives us hope,” said Bharatbala.

“Uthenge Hum”, he says, is the voice of a mother, whose feet are on the ground. “A mother who, through all her pain, is willing to stand in order to protect her family. We have to take our own lives in our own hands and act responsibly for ourselves and the people around us.”

“As we witness the silent suffering and this visible crisis that we are all facing irrespective of whether we are rich, poor, from North or South we have to rise above our boundaries and come together as one. This time, it is with faith and with our families beside us that we will come through,” he said

He feels that people themselves are the silver lining, and the most encouraging and humbling thing to see at this time at every stage of filming, the “incredible bravery and courage of Indians. And for all that we read, and for all the partisan arguments, in a time of crisis, we have seen that we act like a human. This is something we can take heart from, that we haven’t lost our humanity. For us at Virtual Bharat, ‘Uthenge Hum’ came out of compulsion, that we have not seen in our lifetime. We had a duty to document this time. And every effort has been worth it,” he added.