MIFF 2016: Mike Pandey: “We need many more documentary makers”

In 1994, Mike Pandey won the Wildscreen Panda Award, better known as the Green Oscar, for his film on the capture of wild elephants, The Last Migration: Wild Elephant Capture in Surguja.  Till he made the film, nobody believed they existed off the Indian coast! He won the award twice again, in 2000 for Shores of Silence: Whale Sharks in India, and another Panda came for Vanishing Giants (2004), making it a total of three.

Over the years, he has made over 600 films and collected over 300 awards. His long-running TV series, Earth Matters, which included a quiz and prizes, led to the formation of 6,000 Earth Matters Environment Clubs across the country, and hordes of Indians calling themselves Prithvi Putras (sons of the earth). Currently, he heads the Mumbai-based Indian Documentary Producers’ Association (IDPA), in a second term as President. IDPA is a partner with the Films Division for Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF), and conducts the Open Forum. Pandey interacted with the media on 30 January, and spoke about MIFF, IDPA and ways and means of funding documentaries.

“MIFF has come of age. The colours, the hues, all indicate that it is fast becoming the hub of documentary, short and animation film activity in India. More documentaries are being made. More of them are getting popular,” he began. He went on to say, “In a diverse nation like ours, the problems of society are multi-layered. Films of longer duration—one hour or two hours—are needed to address these issues. The purpose of a serious documentary is communication and awareness generation. We need at least ten times more documentary makers to fulfill this need.” he asserted. Cities and towns have enough information. Information must reach the villages, he added. Pre-school children would benefit tremendously by watching relevant and educative programmes twice a day on TV.”

Some four years ago, Pandey, along with the Secretary of IDPA, Sanskar Desai, met the Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, in New Delhi, and submitted a wish list to him, for providing a fillip to the documentary film producers of the country. This plan included the setting up of a nodal agency, bringing together Films Division (FD) and IDPA, and all ministries of the central government, retaining this agency by paying Rs. 10 crore (100 million)/year, to announce and publicise their projects and schemes through films, instead of issuing large press advertisements that cost a bomb, and last a few minutes only, ending up as waste.

Though most of the wishes in the list have yet to be realised, one dream of Pandey and the IDPA was realised a couple of hours before his press conference began. As of 30 January 2016, DD National (India’s state-run television channel under the aegis of Prasar Bharati), with a reach of 80 crores (800 million) started broadcasting a 30-minute documentary made by an IDPA member, and will continue to do so every week for the next three years. And every documentary that is shown in this Saturday 2.30 pm slot will earn a fee of Rs. 2 lakh (2,00,000), award-winning films getting 25% extra! This fee structure is a vast improvement over the norm hitherto.

John Abraham, 'Tigerman' late Fateh Singh Rathore and Mike Pandey

Holding Guru Dutt and Bimal Roy in great esteem, Pandey has been working on his first feature film for the last three years. It is called The Return of the Tiger and stars John Abraham. Amitabh Bachchan will do the voice overs. It will be in the shape of a 90-minute docu-drama. He attributed the delay in completion of the film to the exorbitant demand by a state government, which demands Rs. 80,000/day only as camera fees, considering a multi-camera set-up. If you add all the other shooting expenses, the cost becomes prohibitive.

Asked what is the need of the hour, to support documentary film-makers, he replied with a smile, “A few Bill Gates, who would finance documentaries, as a philanthropic exercise. There are virtually none around in our country. I have found one for my film, the CEO of a corporation, who took sixty seconds to decide that his company would back my effort.” A suggestion was made that IDPA should consider stepping into the void that is created by virtue of the fact that MIFF is biennial, and it dies off a few days after it is over--IDPA should organise one MIFF-like festival every alternate year, when MIFF is not happening. Pandey agreed that it was a good idea and that IDPA would give it serious thought.