DÉJÀ VU a documentary by Bedabrata Pain

2024 began with farmers all over Europe demonstratively raising their voices in protest, while farmers in India re-launch a protest march to Delhi alongside other demonstrations, with MSP at the forefront of their demands.

Against the backdrop of the global rise in farmers’ movement comes the documentary “Déjà vu”. The documentary began in 2021. Barely two months since the launch of the farm laws in India to promote market reforms. In the middle of Covid and a frigid American winter, four Indians were on a ten-thousand-kilometer drive through the farming heartland of America. Because, as it turns out that four decades ago, similar market reforms were ushered in in America. A more classic case of “back to the future” perhaps could not be found. How did the reforms turn out? Who benefitted? Who lost out? Is it the farmers, the consumers, or the corporates? What impact did loss of MSP or ushering in of contract farming have on farmers? Through personal experiences and human stories of small farmers in America, Deja Vu is chronicle of a four decade long history of a much-trumpeted elixir – and a cautionary tale for India. Déjà Vu is the confluence where past meets the future.

DIRECTOR: Bedabrata Pain One of the inventors of CMOS digital camera technology that enabled cell-phones to movie cameras - Bedabrata Pain was an award-winning senior research scientist at NASA and Caltech. He holds over 90 patents and is an inductee to the US Space Technology Hall of Fame. With his debut film Chittagong (2012), he won the Golden Lotus in the Indian National Awards as well as many international awards. Earlier, he was the executive producer of internationally acclaimed Amu (2005) and the documentary called Lifting the Veil (1997). He is currently working on several feature films and web-series in India and in Hollywood. Dr. Pain is a technology consultant for the prime movie camera maker RED Digital Cinema. He received his B. Tech. degree from IIT Kharagpur in 1986, and his Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1992, and taught in UCLA from 1998-2008, and has received prestigious awards such as the Lew-Allen Award, NASA Inventors Award, and IIT Distinguished Alumnus Award.

ALL ARE INVITED!