It is a year to the day Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a nation-wide total lockdown in an attempt to rein in the coronavirus. The ...
It is a year to the day Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a nation-wide total lockdown in an attempt to rein in the coronavirus. The lockdown was lifted months ago, but the Covid-19 pandemic has shown no signs of abating. Perhaps the only silver lining in reports of a renewed surge in infections is that a vaccination drive against the virus is now underway.
Indeed, photographs of Indians giving thumbs-up signs after receiving their innoculations jostle with images of crowded marketplaces that encourage the spread of the disease and people with ear-buds stuck up their nostrils being tested for the virus. Vinod Kapri’s 1232 Kms reminds us to never forget another set of images – those of desperate and hungry migrant Indians walking or cycling vast distances to reach their homes.
The documentary takes us back to some of the wrenching scenes that resulted from the government’s decision to impose a harsh lockdown at four hours’ notice. As the lockdown kept being extended and it became clear that migrant workers in cities were not going to be able to hold out any longer without wages or the ability to pay for food, they went into “atmanirbhar” mode. Abandoned by their employers, local administrations and the Union government, thousands of men, women and children displayed desperate self-reliance by walking, cycling or hitching...
