A box of letters is found on the campus of the Film and Television Institute of India. Signed by a student with the name \u00bbL\u00ab, the letters trace the incursion of the Hindu Nationalist BJP under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has been in office since May 2014, into the left-liberal environment of the film school. An invented archive becomes an outlet for a personal and social crisis.<\/p>\n
The 16\u00a0mm black-and-white images, juxtaposed with the fictional letters read aloud, appear in dream-like \u2013 bad dreams, that is \u2013 form. Exuberant dance scenes are slowly followed by images of strikes and protests that swept the country in response to the new citizenship law and the rise in tuition fees. While \u00bbL\u00ab laments the end of an inter-caste love in her letters, the demonstrators shout the right to free choices in private as well as political life. The freedom to say \u00bbyes\u00ab clashes with increasing discrimination against women, Muslims, Dalits and critical journalists under Modi\u2019s rule. As the violence continues to escalate, the students search for answers to the question of what role a state-aided film school should play in such times.<\/p>\n