Niam/Faith/Hynniewtrep
Tarun Bhartiya
India is being remade. Once celebrated as a great pluralist success of decolonized nation building, many of its post-colonial benchmarks are being quickly reworked, erased, made redundant. But if you watched India from Khasi-Jaintia Hills of its Northeast, you would have seen the glorious Indian story a bit askew.
For the last thirteen years, I have been trying to make sense of the idea of faith and identity and contestations around the questions of faith and nation making amongst the Khasi Jaintia people. Fourteen because in 2006, revival swept through these hills turning children into prophets. Travelling within the hills and the Welsh Calvinist Methodist Missionary Archives at Aberystwyth in Wales examining the politics of identity making.
About Artist
Tarun Bhartiya
Tarun Bhartiya is a Maithil documentary image-maker, Hindi poet and political activist based in Shillong, Khasi Hills, India. His photographs and image essays have been published in magazines and as covers of many books.
Tarun Bhartiya's films include Brief Life of Insects (2015, MIFF, Best Sound Award), The Last Train in Nepal (2015, BBC4, RTS award for Best Director, Factual), Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (Royal Television Society Award, Best documentary series 2010), Tourist Information for Shillong (2007) as well as music videos for several Shillong bands.
As an editor he has worked on notable films with filmmakers like Vasudha Joshi (Girl Song, 2003 and Cancer Katha Special Jury Award, National Awards 2012), Red Ant Dream (Editor & Co-Writer, Sanjay Kak, 2014), Jashn-e-Azadi (Sanjay Kak 2007). He returned his National Award for Best Editing for In Camera (Ranjan Palit 2010) in protest against the state fascism.
His poems and their translations have appeared in various anthologies including Dancing Earth: Contemporary poetry from North East India (Penguin).
He is a member of Thma U Rangli Juki (TUR), a progressive people's group in Meghalaya and part of RAIOT Webzine, www.raiot.in
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