India has a rich history of environmental films, mostly fiction, that were never looked at from an ecological lens. After the 1990s, such films have been fewer, but some filmmakers are now changing that, even winning the occasional Oscar
Shaunak Sen, director of All That Breathes, which was nominated for an Oscar
Image: Amit Verma
The year is 1971, and an unlikely cinematic pair has caught the public’s fancy. Actor Rajesh Khanna and… an elephant.
Haathi Mere Saathi (and its catchy title song, ‘Chal, chal, chal, mere haathi, O mere saathi’), a story about an orphan (Khanna) and four elephants building a life and livelihood together, captured the imagination of the Indian moviegoer, making it a record-breaking hit that year. More than 50 years later, another human-elephant film from India made history, as The Elephant Whisperers (2022) won an Oscar for Best Documentary Short, a first for the country.
Between the five decades and the two tales of elephants, some change is afoot. The former received both critical acclaim and commercial success. The latter famously received top accolades, but also received applause for raising awareness about wildlife conservation.
“When Haathi Mere Saathi was released in the 1970s, and Pather Panchali by Satyajit Ray in the 1950s, those films were not seen as ecological films,” says Pankaj Jain, professor at Flame University, Pune, teaching philosophy and religious studies. “I think that’s because ecology was never a separate category from human society, or Indian or human culture, right? Animals, trees, nature, rain were always integral part of being human.”
Today, however, that context has changed.