Feb 22 2026 to Feb 22 2026 6 p.m.

Price: 100 Book/Buy

Where

Courtyard Koota

Ground floor, Good Earth Tarana Good Earth Malhar, near Rajarajeswari medical college Kambipura, Bengaluru, Karnataka 560074

Event Description

English Title: FARMING THE REVOLUTION
Original Title: INQILAB DI KHETI
Countries of Production: India, France, Norway
Month & Year of Completion: April 2024
Original Language: Panjabi and Hindi
Duration: 105 min

Indian farmers raise an epic protest against newly enacted farm laws, reaping a rare victory over the state.

View trailer here

Farming the Revolution takes us to the heart of the massive year-long protests against the Indian government’s then newly enacted farm laws during the COVID lockdown. Over half a million protesters gathered – men and women from all generations, religions, classes and castes – and reinvented co-existence at massive protest sites that burgeoned on the borders of Delhi. The film invites us to experience the everyday textures and indomitable spirit of this historic farmers ’movement – until, finally, victory!

In November 2020, Gurbaz Sangha, a young farmer from Punjab, embarked on a remarkable journey. Riding his tractor 400 kilometres to Delhi, he joined forces with thousands, and later more than half a million, men and women from many parts of the country. Their united mission: to stand against the newly enacted farm laws. These farmers believed that if implemented, these laws would negatively impact the government-protected farmers ’markets, leaving the farmers to the vagaries of the free market. Amid a COVID lockdown, the farmers – representing over half of India’s workforce – vowed to remain at the borders until the laws were repealed. The protest cities that mushroomed outside Delhi created a parallel world where they redefined co-existence, with women emerging as equal political partners. Day after day, the protesters – largely overlooked by the mainstream media – showcased India’s pluralistic, defiant and resilient spirit. As the movement gained momentum, farmers from across the country, along with trade unions of industrial workers, rallied in solidarity. The scale of these protests echoed the spirit of India’s independence movement, culminating in an unexpected, triumphant outcome.

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT – NISHTHA JAIN
Over the last five years, public discontent has been growing with the Indian government’s failure to implement many of its 2014 election promises, the large-scale sale of public companies and assets to private corporations, growing religious intolerance, and the take- over of institutions meant to protect democracy. There’s been an increasing crackdown on human rights, threatening brave voices of dissent with detention. In 2020, a similar fate awaited the Indian farmers when they began their agitation against the newly enacted farm laws. But the unthinkable happened: in a radically peaceful way, over a period of a year, the protesters reinvented the very meaning of power.

Over a period of thirteen months, my team and I were witness to the exceptional bravery of the protesting farmers, to their speaking truth to power, and their remarkable resourcefulness. Their determination, perseverance, discipline and patience were deeply inspiring. Spearheaded as the movement is by extraordinary leaders, the film’s protagonists didn’t just hope or pray for success, or weigh their chances when it came to action. They embraced a totally different language. They came to win and they did!
The scale and duration of the protest, while being awe-inspiring, were also a challenge. It was the year of the COVID lockdown. I was fortunate to be able to put together a young and dedicated team, which stayed on till the end to capture the collective energy of the protest and the individual transformations of the protagonists.

The film gives the viewers an almost day-to-day experience of the protests, through changing seasons, while challenging popular misconceptions about farmers as country bumpkins or conservatives. We meet evolved, wise, educated, informed people – many tall leaders, writers, poets and singers.

Surrounded by police barricades, the farmers create a zone – a zone of possibilities, a zone of freedom within which the normal laws of the police state don’t apply. It becomes a place of optimism, hope, and action. A zone of camaraderie. The farmers tend to the sick, feed each other, and continuously upgrade their shelters to adapt to the elements. They transform their farm implements into sleeping platforms, libraries, schools, and stages of protest. The culture of sharing, community and jugaad (indigenous ad hoc problem- solving) is on full display here. There are mini- universities/ communes with libraries, community kitchens, film screening spaces. In this unprecedented assemblage of people from all caste and class backgrounds, urban and rural, young and old, with women participating in large numbers,
we see how roots in faith and revolutionary thinking may coexist.

FILM CREW
Director: Nishtha Jain
Co-Director & DOP: Akash Basumatari
Location Sound: Lohit Bhalla
Writers: Nishtha Jain, Deborah Matzner, Valérie Montmartin
Editor: Giles Gardner, Nishtha Jain, Anand Gautam
Music Composer: Florencia Di Concilio (Published by LDM Editions)
Sound Designer: Niraj Gera
Colourist & Graphics: Tom Chr. Lilletvedt
Producers: Nishtha Jain (Raintree Films, India), Valérie Montmartin (Little Big Story)
Co-Producer: Torstein Grude (Piraya Film)
Sales Agent: Cinephil
In Co-production with Arte France, Al Jazeera

BIO-FILMOGRAPHY (DIRECTOR)
NISHTHA JAIN is a renowned filmmaker from India, best known for her critically acclaimed films – Farming the Revolution (2024), The Golden Thread (2022), Gulabi Gang (2012), Lakshmi and Me (2007). Farming the Revolution (2024) premiered at Hot Docs and won the Oscar-qualifying Best International Documentary Prize.

Jain is a Chicken & Egg Award winner (2020); a Member of the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences (AMPAS); a Film Independent Global Media Maker Fellow (2019-20); and a Recipient of Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Excellence Fellowship (2019).

Jain’s films have been screened at over 250 international film festivals including IDFA, Busan Film Festival, Sydney Film Festival, Zurich Film Festival, Hot Docs, and Sheffield Docfest. The films have won numerous international and national awards.

Jain has served as a juror at Sydney Film Festival (2025); Head of International Jury Flahertiana Film Festival 2025; TIDF 2024; Zurich International Film Festival; IDSFFK; Cinema Verité Film Festival Teheran 2013; and IDFA 2008. Jain has presented her films at numerous universities including Stanford, NYU, Wellesley, UCSB, Northwestern University, UT Austin, Cambridge, University of London, St. Andrews, Heidelberg, Danish Film School, Film & TV Institute of India, Pune, Satyajit Ray Film & TV Institute. Jain’s films have received support from the IDFA Bertha Fund, Sundance Documentary Fund, Chicken & Egg Pictures, Sorfund, Alter Cine Foundation, Indian Foundation for the Arts. They've been broadcast on ARTE France, France TV, PBS, DR, NRK, YLE and Al Jazeera Documentary Channel.