Director Richie Mehta to capture India through its people’s conversations

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Scott and Kashyap will serve as executive producers, while other filmmakers, Zoya Akhtar, Shekhar Kapur and R Balki, will be the creative consultants. Mehta says, “The team from Google and Scott Free Productions (Scott’s production company) was looking for a South Asian director for India in a Day. They knew that two of my other films — Amal and Siddharth — were inspired by conversations with real people. They wanted a director with that type of profile and I was keen to do the job.” For Mehta, who has worked with actors such as Naseeruddin Shah, Seema Biswas and Tannishtha Chatterjee, the challenge of working on the raw footage to create a polished product was exciting. The film is expected to release next summer.

The inspiration for India in a Day is drawn from the crowd-sourced documentary called Life in a Day, which put together video clips that showed moments from 192 nations, all shot on July 24, 2010. This documentary, which was co-produced by Scott Free Productions and YouTube, was released on YouTube in 2011. This was followed by other crowd-sourced documentaries such as Italy in a Day, Britain in a Day and Japan in a Day.

The biggest hurdle, according to the director, is simply getting the word out. “One guy told me how he has a fight with his chaiwalla every day, about the amount of milk and sugar in the tea. I asked him to film that, because who knows what story we might get out of it?” says Mehta.

But making sure that little-heard voices get their due in the film is a concern too. “I want to make sure that as many people as possible are represented. I know, we’ll get videos from the urban centres, but we also need them to come from the rural areas.” The Canada-based filmmaker is also talking to wildlife conservation groups to contribute footage of animal-human interactions, so that even the struggles of wildlife in a rapidly developing nation, can be addressed.

Mehta clarifies that it is not his intention to make a political film, although he is aware that such concerns are bound to find their way in. He says, “If someone chooses to talk about how the lack of a good road in their village prevents them from getting the medical attention they need during emergencies, we will use it, if it is honest and intimate. At the same time, if you feel you can tell your story by filming your grandmother as she makes dal or by filming a sunset, that is okay too.”