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Aakash Prabhakar is an Actor, Filmmaker, Writer, and a Theatre Director who runs a Film and a Theatre Production company of his own by the name of Here And Now. He has a Post Graduate Diploma in Theatre Making and Performance Arts from The Drama School Mumbai and a degree in Mass Communication from The Mumbai University.
After Acting in, Writing, and directing 50 Odd theatre productions , short films , tv shows and winning accolades in theatre festivals across the country, he pursued film making from NYFA and made his first feature Freddie’s piano in 2019. Freddie's Piano, which he directed and acted in was the official selection of the New York Indian Film Festival 2020 and 20 other International Film Festivals across the world. The film won the Best Director Award for Freddie’s Piano at the Indian Film Festival Of Cincinnati , Best Film Jury- Indigo Moon Film Festival , North Carolina and several other awards.
Since 2005, Aditi Banerjee has worked as a director, writer, producer, and a teacher. Her filmmaking is not bound by genres.
Aditi has a post-graduate degree in Film & Video Communication from National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, M.A. in English Literature from Jawaharlal Nehru University and a B.A.(Honours) in English Literature from St. Stephen's College, Delhi University.
Her work has been telecast on Hotstar, National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Al Jazeera and Fox and has won awards in India as well as abroad. She has worked on projects for AXN, Network 18 and Star World.
Her last project was an indie web series titled Love at Fifth Floor, which was shown in festivals in US, Canada and France and is available to watch on Hotstar. She sold a web series idea to a major streaming platform and is currently developing a feature script in Writer’s Ink Script Lab.
Akshata Dalvi is an architect, writer, and director based in Goa, Mumbai, and Dublin. She started her journey assisting filmmakers Sumitra Bhave and Sunil Sukthankar with their Marathi features and short films. She has received film fellowships for her two documentary films. She has received recognition internationally for her first documentary film ‘Avashesh’. She has majorly worked in production design teams with eminent production designers in India for various films, web series, and TV commercials for the last 8 years. Akshata is developing her first feature fiction film.
Ambarien is an award-winning writer-director. She was trained as a filmmaker at Jamia Millia Islamia, India and Temple University, USA, where she was a Fulbright-Nehru Fellow.
Ambarien's feature screenplays have been selected for the Athena Screenwriters Lab, New York, Stowe Story Lab, 1497 and shortlisted at Sundance. Her films have screened at top festivals such as Indian Panorama, International Film Festival of India, Mumbai International Film Festival, New Filmmakers New York, Queens World Film Festival, British Film Institute and others.
She lives between New Delhi and Chicago where she teaches Film Directing at The School of Cinematic Arts, DePaul University.
Anita Balagopalan has over 20 years of experience in Television Production and Journalism. A lifelong learner, she is a double postgraduate with degrees in Mass Communication and English Literature. She also has training and certifications in digital marketing, creative writing, and teaching English as a foreign language. Anita has worked across many industries, using her love for writing and storytelling in each role. She has been a Producer, Anchor and Correspondent at CNBC-TVB18, run her own production house in Mumbai, taught English to primary school students in Hong Kong, written teacher guide notes for Americans teaching Indian mythology, created English enhancement curriculums for foreign learners, freelanced as a scriptwriter and researcher for TV infotainment shows, headed Communications and Social Media Strategy for a social enterprise and been the Senior Editor for a leading digital lifestyle magazine in Hong Kong. This is her first foray into feature film writing.
Anureet Watta is a 22 year old screenwriter, filmmaker, lyricist and poet living in Delhi. Fairly new in the industry, they created their debut short film, ‘Kinaara’(2021) independently on a zero budget in 2021. The film traveled to 14 international film festivals and several universities, including the Oscar Qualifying BISFF; and bagged a myriad of awards. Their second short film, ‘Oranges in the Winter Sun’(2022), was produced by Lotus Visual Productions and had its North American Premiere in IMAGES Festival, Toronto. It has traveled to 8 film festivals so far.
Previously, they co-wrote a feature film with Faraz Arif Ansari (Sheer Qorma) that is yet to go into production. Prior to their encounters with filmmaking, they practiced theater, focusing on street theater, through their college dramatics society. Their works largely involve queerness, politics and identity vis vis abstract concepts such as memory, the gaze and the boundaries of language.
Born and raised in the small hill station of Haflong, Arijit is a filmmaker with a passion for storytelling. Having grown up in a culturally diverse environment, he has always been fascinated by the stories that people have to tell. After completing his graduation in digital media from Bangalore, he discovered his interest in filmmaking as he explored world cinema.
Determined to pursue a career in filmmaking, Arijit enrolled in a diploma program in Filmmaking from Mumbai. It was during this time that he began working on my first feature script, which took him two years to complete. Since then, I have written two screenplays, both of which explore the daily struggles of human life and the moral and psychological needs that drive us.
As a filmmaker, Arijit is deeply committed to telling stories that resonate with audiences on a personal level. He believes that films have the power to inspire, challenge, and transform us, and we strive to create work that reflects this belief.
Arshaly Jose is a Software developer, writer and Film maker. She was selected for a mini-MFA program by Anita Nair. She has co-written an Indie thriller film and made a short film. Her stories and articles have been published or are upcoming in Film companion, Prosererity Literary magazine etc. She is interested in exploring the confluence of gender, politics, and culture in India through stories. She has recently completed her first feature film script with Writer’s Ink lab. When not writing, she can be found in her room in Hyderabad snuggled up with a book or watching a film or endlessly scrolling Insta to “research” pop culture.
Bidhidatta is a Psychology graduate with a Liberal Arts diploma. She has freelanced as a film critic for film pages online and worked with a local film society called Lost The Plot in Pune and a theater society called International Association for Performing Arts and Research in Pune. She recently dabbled into advertising with OnlyMuchLouder, Mumbai.
Devang is a professional screenwriter and researcher based in Mumbai with 3 years of experience. He is a writer and a researcher on Anurag Kashyap’s adaptation of Suketu Mehta’s Maximum City. Additionally, he is also a part of writer’s room for an Indian adult animation show and the researcher and co-writer of a Hindi film adaptation of a non-Hindi language Indian film.
Previously, he has worked as a journalist and writer whose work has been published in BuzzFeed, The Hindu, Quartz, Film Companion, FirstPost, and Homegrown..
A passionate cinephile, he is the founder of Mumbai Subtitles Database, a volunteer social media account which has been posting about the subtitled shows of non-Hindi films in Mumbai for nearly 4 years. He maintains a keen academic interest in film history and its evolution, in India and around the world.
The Shapes We Take is Devang's first solo feature film screenplay.
Dhruv Solanki is a writer /director based in Vadodara. After Graduating in electrical engineering, he worked as a chemistry faculty for six years before quitting his job to pursue filmmaking. He was one of the finalist (Top 20) of TAKE TEN organised by Netflix India and Film Companion. He has written and directed several short films, some of which have played in several Indian film festivals. His debut feature as writer/ director, IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD, is currently in post production.
Gowtham has completed his Digital Film Making course from LV Prasad Institute. He is a Teach For India alumnus and a graduate from Amrita School of Engineering. He currently works as an incubation manager with Villgro, India’s oldest & largest social business incubator. He supports social entrepreneurs to develop better businesses and has worked on Agri, Dairy, Climate spaces and with government agencies, policy think tanks and self-help groups. These experiences have led him to connect meaningfully with people from remote corners of India and abroad. Time & again, facts have proved to be more fascinating than fiction.
Kanishk Devgan, or Kandy, is an interdisciplinary creative whose work spans prose, poetry, satire, short films, the occasional music video, and over 40 pieces of film criticism for Film Companion, recognised by Rotten Tomatoes. Their first professional screenplay, 'Suttabaazi', was nominated for ‘Best Short Film’ at the Filmfare Awards. Their short film 'Qabil’s Quarantine' won the Jury prize for ‘Best Film’ at India Film Project’s Quarantine Film Challenge, and their music video 'Goldfish, Goldfish' won ‘Best Music Video’ at the Tagore International Film Festival. Their debut poetry collection 'Please Glue This Book Together' was published in 2016. Kanishk studied Media Studies, Creative Writing, and Political Science at Ashoka University, where they founded and led the satire publication Kalinga. They currently work as an editor for Deloitte. You can find them @yikeskandy on Instagram and Twitter, or asleep in their bed.
Karuna’s first film as writer - director ‘Kadavu’, produced by the Ford Foundation, was a part of festivals BISFF, IAWRT, and was invited to be a part of the Indo-German Film Week at Berlin. She started her career as Associate Creative Producer at Balaji Motion Pictures. She went on to head Content at Drishyam Films. She was a part of films like ‘Newton’, ‘Rukh’. Her film as Creative Producer - ‘Ghaath’ was nominated for the GWFF award at Berlinale. She was Senior Supervising Producer on 'Sherni', Associate Producer on 'Jalsa' and recently the untitled Hindi remake of 'Soorarai Pottru' directed by Sudha Kongara. Karuna wrote and directed ‘Kukbi’, produced by Abundantia Entertainment, official selection at the BISFF, won an honorable mention at the Radiance film festival, won best Actor and Actress awards at JISFF - Korea, received an honorable mention at Roshd Film Festival, Indian Premiere at IDSFFK - Kerala. Karuna is signed by Abundantia Entertainment for her debut feature.
Manasvini, from a young age, had an interest in stories as they enabled her to create visual worlds in her mind.Being an absolute movie buff, her path eventually led her to take up filmmaking as a career.After graduating with a degree in Visual Communication in 2019, she was given an opportunity to work in a Tamil feature film Boomika as the 2nd Assistant Director.Working in the field taught her a lot and made her confident about her career decision. She enjoyed the process thoroughly from the pre-production stages till the release.The movie was released on Netflix. After Boomika, she also worked on the episode "Inmai" in the series Navarasa, produced by Mr Mani Ratnam and Netflix, in its pre-production and postproduction.Following this, she got to direct a few smaller projects. At the beginning of 2022, she applied for Netflix and Film Companion's Take Ten initiative and was funded to direct her short film, Bijli. Her goal now is to create content that is entertaining and impactful.
Neel is a screenwriter based out of Navi-Mumbai. He is currently developing a coming-of-age feature at The WritersInk Screenwriting Lab under Sushma Khadepaun’s guidance, a renowned educator at Columbia University and Sundance Collab. Neel's diverse experience includes serving as a 'Story Producer' on the independent documentary 'KASHMIRI NAZARIYA', mentored by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Aviva Slesin. In his early years, Neel's short film script 'Overdose' was a top 5 finalist at IFP, and he was shortlisted in the top 60 writers out of 900 for the Star Writers Programme in 2017. Before pursuing screenwriting, Neel spent over three years as a talent manager at Tulsea, where he worked with some of India's leading filmmaking talent behind titles like SACRED GAMES, HOUSE OF SECRETS, and FEELS LIKE ISHQ. He started his media career eight years ago making YouTube sketches and corporate videos. When he's not busy writing, you can find him experimenting with music at his home studio.
Nishant’s first short film Daaravtha (2016) got him the coveted National Award for Best Debut Film of a Director. The film also won 'Best Short' each at Indian Film Festivals of New York, Houston, and Los Angeles and was in Official Selection at Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF Kids) and Palm Springs Shortfest. Thereafter, he worked as a Script Reader for Fox Star (2017-20). His second short film Gair (2022) is now doing its festival rounds. At Zee Studios (2013-16), he worked on successful and critically acclaimed Marathi films like Sairat (Berlinale, 2016), Killa (Crystal Bear, Berlinale, 2014), Elizabeth Ekadashi (National Awards, 2015) and Fandry (London Film Festival, 2013) as an Executive Producer. He worked as an Executive Producer for Zee TV (2010-2013) on several successful shows and headed Digital Media promotions for films at Zee Studios (2013-2016). He has written two feature films which are under development and is currently working as an independent screenwriter.
Pournima is a career police woman, presently working as Commandant of an armed battalion with the Maharashtra police, and mother to a 10 year old girl. She had taken a sabbatical from work and studied screenplay writing at FTII Pune. She has worked as a consultant for police procedural films, and with well known filmmakers on developing crime dramas. She had also written a commissioned screenplay for the pilot of a true life crime limited series. Her decades of experience as a cop offers a unique perspective in telling stories that deal with human nature at its extremes. Having lived and worked in the hinterlands of India gave her a first hand experience of what it means to be a woman in a deeply patriarchal society where religion, caste and class still play a very important role in everyday lives, and shaping of our destinies. She wants to tell stories that draw from her personal experiences and have left a deep impact on her.
Priyanka Banerjee is a Filmfare award-winning writer-director and Founder of Leogirl-Productions, a boutique production company specialising in branded content for clients. Over the 5 years of running Leogirl, she has written-directed commercials for Nykaa, Google, Dell, VIVO, IBM, Bumble, Sunsilk and many more. She has also written-directed the fiction short films Commas (2017) and Dayalu (2018) which found recognition at festivals such as River to River Florence India Film Festival, Indisches Film Festival (Stuttgart, Germany), International Film Festival of South Asia- Toronto, New Delhi International Film Festival and several others. Priyanka's latest fiction venture as a writer-director was the powerful short on women and sisterhood starring Kajol, Neha Dhupia, Shruti Haasan and 6 other dynamic artists called Devi. The film won Best Short Film (People’s Choice) at the Filmfare Awards 2021 and has over 20 million views as of today, one of the highest ever for an Indian short film.
Her first screenplay ‘A Brown coat’ was an NFDC Screenwriter’s Lab selection 2020, and a quarter-finalist at the Atlanta Film Festival Screenwriting competition 2020. She won the Pocketwala-Cinestaan Web Series Idea Contest 2021 for ‘Anthology of Bombay Stories: slice-of-life’. Her poetry film Skirt showcased on Shonda Rhimes’ Shondaland. Her poetry readings feature on Disney+ Hotstar/ Shorts-English. She participated in the SWA contest with her 3-Season mythology action drama. Besides project 'Ranjani', she has 5 other feature screenplays ready for production. Rochelle Potkar is the author of four books of poetry, a story collection, and a novel. She has a cacophony of characters and story worlds in her head.
Rohan Shyam Chowdhury is a writer and a filmmaker based in Calcutta and Mumbai. He holds a degree in Engineering, and the Young India Fellowship in Liberal Arts from Ashoka University. His first stint as a filmmaker was in collaboration with a Delhi-based NGO for whom he directed short films and multimedia campaigns around gender, sexuality, and body positivity. In 2022, Rohan was one of the 10 filmmakers chosen for the TakeTen Short Film Competition, a pilot initiative by Film Companion in partnership with Netflix. Written and directed by him, his short titled 'Lokkhon Rekha' is currently available on Netflix India’s YouTube channel.
Going forward, Rohan hopes to tell stories that have, at their heart, people, and the issues that plague us and yet often go unheard. He hopes to visually narrate them in ways that cater to and are relatable at most to the ordinary middle class, as he believes they are the ones truly capable of bringing about change.
Sagar Saurabh is a lyricist, actor and filmmaker who hailed from a remote village of Sonitpur, Assam (India) and is currently based out of Mumbai. Growing up in the pristine countryside of Assam, he focuses on the languid ease of Assamese rural life and the essence of a delicately touched land of the past.
He has been actively involved in filmmaking: co-written and played a major role in Bhaskar Hazarika’s feature film ‘Aamis’ (Ravening) (2019), which premiered in Tribeca. He also has co-written The Headmaster’s Son (2022) which is in the last leg of post-production. His short film 'An Afternoon With A Stranger' (2022) is his directorial debut which was selected for the short film market in the prestigious Clermont Ferrand International Short Film Festival 2023 and is recently selected for the SiGNS Film Festival 2023. His feature-length project 'A Pistol' is selected for the Writers INK Feature Film Screenwriting Lab 2022.
Sai Pradyumna is a management graduate, currently working with Accenture, as a Senior business integration and Architecture analyst. Previously he worked with two major MNC's including Accenture, in the Fin-OPS domain.
Samhita started out in Vir Das’ Comedy Company for 5 years as a Senior Writer. She has written 10+ projects (TV & Film) over the span of her 7-year career. Having graduated with her MFA in Creative Writing from The New School in New York City, Samhita brings a strong grasp of Character Work, Story Building, and organic Dialogue Writing to the table. Some of Samhita’s completed work includes Non-fiction Comedy Writing like “Jestination Unknown” on Amazon Prime, a segment on Conan O’Brein’s show called “Rest of the World, and “POTCAST”, a new-comedy Youtube Show.
More recently, Samhita has been in a handful of Writers’ Rooms. A few of them are:
- A web-series with Shakun Batra, Vir Das & Kavi Shastri.
- A mockumentary with Sikandar Kher produced by Anupam Kher Studios.
- An American Comedy Feature Created and Produced by Vir Das with FeigCo.
- A Multi-Season Sitcom Produced by Emmay Entertainment.
Soma grew up in Kolkata. MBA and work-life brought her to Mumbai.She built much-loved brands, for local & global consumers; for eighteen years as Chief Marketer in MNC companies.Soma received many awards including Economic Times Top 25 Leaders of India Inc. She’s trained at:Mckee’s Story, MET film school, WWI. In 2016, Soma quit her CMO job in a Fortune 50 company. Since then, she’s written 3 feature specs that placed in top 2% in CINESTAAN Competition in both 2018&2019. Her series pitch placed in top 3% in MX player pitch-fest(2019). In 2021, battling kidney failure in hospital-beds, Soma found community in a Writing podcast. Consequently, Soma became integral to a group of 5 writers/directors(US based) who meet daily online to write.This keeps her focused and evolving. Despite genre & form, Soma’s stories are always authentic; with a spiritual underpinning, that make us question our set paradigms.Now, after a successful kidney transplant, Soma is excited to start her second career.
Sukriti is a screenwriter and author. She is currently developing a web-series with Oscar-nominated director Ashutosh Gowariker. She also writes originals for film and web, and is represented by the agency Exceed. She was the Virtual-Reality film critic for YouTube platform Film Companion.
Sukriti holds an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Columbia University. Her writing has been featured by Vox, Quartz, Bustle, The Hindu, and The New Statesman. She was the book researcher for The Power of Bad (2019), by New York Times’ columnist John Tierney.
Sukriti is a graduate of the London School of Economics, and Dhirubhai Ambani International School. She has lived and worked in New York City, Denver, London & Singapore. She is now based in Mumbai.
Sulagna Chatterjee is a 26-year-old Mumbai-based screenwriter, who started writing in 2018 and as an associate writer, having worked on shows like Code M and Verdict for AltBalaji and multiple non-fiction shows.
Her independent writing career started in 2020 with the third season of Firsts, for DICE Media. Her second independent project is an episode on Netflix India's anthology series Feels Like Ishq, produced by Mutant Films, titled ""She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not"" and was directed by Danish Aslam. In September 2020, she ventured into direction and directed her first short film: a dark comedy called The Visit.
In 2021 November, her third show Adulting s03 released on Amazon MiniTV. Her fourth show that is slated to release in mid-2023 is a legal thriller.
Drama and romance come naturally to her, but her love for the twisted nature of life gives her the drive to write thrillers as well.
After completing a screenwriting course at Film and Television Institute of India, Supriya Prasad Rauniar directed Portrait of a Willow Woman single-handedly. The film has been part of official selection at the Indian Film Festival of Stuttgart, Germany 2021, Indian Film Festival of Melbourne, Australia 2021, Tasveer South Asian Film Festival, US etc. and was recently screened at Nehru Centre London, UK. She is passionate about telling stories of minorities, children, women’s sexuality, and coming of age stories. Her debut feature project, The Honeybee Girl was part of the Journey to Europe: Scriptwriting Development Lab organized by the European Union Film Festival in association with the Dharamshala International Film Festival and Cineuropa. She is also among the top ten finalists of Doc Commune 2022 organized by PSBT India. Currently, she is working as a writer on an Amazon web series.
Utpala Barve dreamed of working in movies ever since she was a kid. With that goal, she got a MA in Costume Design for Performance from London College of Fashion, after her Bachelors in Fashion design. Once in Mumbai, she told her stories through the medium of costumes. In the last 9 years, she has worked in films and web series across India, in Hindi, Marathi and Tamil. As a Costume Designer, her work has been seen in prestigious international film festivals.
After having worked with some of the masters in the industry, Utpala turned to writing in 2020 with a desire to expand her means of storytelling and really own the narrative. She co-wrote a web series for Dice media that is being pitched around and is developing her first feature script for this lab.
In the course of her work and as a hobby she loves to travel, and the places she travels and people she meets greatly inspire and inform her writing.
Uttara is a writer and director. She has an MA in Filmmaking from Kingston University (2010) and a certificate in Creative Writing from Simon Fraser University (2020). Her early career encompasses a background in TV production, branding and copywriting and as an assistant director with Rising Sun and Aamir Khan Productions. Uttara wrote, directed and produced her first short film called “The Twist” (2020) which has 8 million+views on YouTube . She went on to make music videos for Rochak Kohli, Rasika Sekar and Anicia Kohler. Uttara has directed episodes for a web series called “Adulting, S3 '' for Amazon Minitv x Dice Media. She has also directed comedy sketches for Civic Studios and Filter Copy.
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Aanchal is a filmmaker and lawyer based between London and Mumbai. A Delhi girl who moved to London to study law, and stayed on to practice at a Magic Circle law firm for 6 years. Aanchal has attended MetFilm School in London, and her graduation short film “Haklu”, is currently doing its festival rounds, having been selected for festivals in the UK and the US. Aanchal is also in development for a feature documentary, “Beyond Disco”, a documentary based on LA based record label Discostan and Nermin Niazi’s 1984 album, “Beyond Disco”, with an Emmy-nominated producer.
Aanchal is interested in giving a voice to subaltern narratives that draw on perspectives from the Global South, particularly on social and cultural themes that are important to the internationally-minded global citizen.
Aanchal is a member of Brown Girls Doc Mafia, and is currently attending NFTS in the UK.
Adarsh Modi graduated with a degree in Media & Entertainment before he joined as an in-house writer at a production house. Now he is a freelance writer. There he wrote many corporate AVs, ad campaigns: such as the Blink X ‘Made for the Market Campaign’ and also developed multiple fiction series concepts. He also developed a rom-com series with an independent production house which is in the pre-commission stage. Having written several short films and now this feature length film, Adarsh is now off to directing his first short film. He is also working on his next feature length script. All in all, Adarsh loves storytelling.
Akanksha Kalhe is a semi-finalist at the SWA Pitch Fest’23, with her dystopian-sci-fi series, ‘Guilto’. She was also an NFDC x Netflix Screenwriting Program Alumnus. A film editor for more than half a decade, she has worked with leading platforms like Film Companion, Netflix, and Amazon Prime among others. She was the editor for a 10-part travel docu-series for Outlook Traveller & a narrative-short, ‘Saahas’- streaming on SonyLIV. Her recent stint on a crime docu-series with Juggernaut Productions x Applause Entertainment is in post-production. Akanksha is currently editing a documentary feature with director and producer Ben Rekhi. Alongside her editing work, she directed and co-wrote her debut- ‘Swargdhaara’ – a comedy of errors – at age 20, leading a crew of over 40. In her spare time, Akanksha paints, sings, and watches Mukbang videos.
Amir Musanna is self taught filmmaker, having acquired the tools of the trade by watching films voraciously. In his eight years of experience as a professional, he has directed a TVF web series ‘Hostel Daze S2’, a couple of mini series, directed over 30 sketches and a couple music videos. Amir also loves delving into the technical aspects of film, having done edit and sound design for a films in the past. He is an active learner and has done multiple workshops in various aspects of film like writing, cinematography, editing, documentary film, and animation to approach the medium with a nuanced yet varied perspective.
Anagha Mohan calls herself an accidental writer. Boredom led her to start writing a blog called ‘Women to Ponder”—a blog that dissects female characters in cinema. Like Aristotle, she loves writing about the beauty of tragedy. Anagha graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English Literature and went on to pursue her master’s in audio-visual communication from Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communications, Pune. She started her career as an associate creative producer with Sony Pictures Network India and went on to work with OTT platforms and VFX studios. If she is not writing or watching a movie, she can be found reading, learning a new language, painting away, or doing culture and heritage walks.
Angad started his creative journey as an assistant director while studying at The Doon School, Dehradun. Subsequently, he pursued a degree in Advertising at Jai Hind College, Mumbai, graduating in 2014. Post-college, Angad continued working as an assistant director on advertisements, shorts, and feature films like The Forest, Dekh Tamasha Dekh, The Corner Table, Airlift, and No Fathers in Kashmir. Recently, Angad has written and directed the short films Take 2 and Unresolved, which garnered recognition at over 25 international film festivals, including the esteemed New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) and the International Film Festival of South Asia (IFFSA) in Toronto.
Aniket Gauns is a screenwriter from Goa, currently in Mumbai. He got his first push during the SWA pitch fest 2022, where he was among the top 25. A little ego massage for him and he has never stopped since and wants to be a professional screenwriter. His keen interest are in writing drama and thriller. An engineering background also helps to gravitate towards sci-fi. Spending most of his life in Goa, Aniket has a good sense of the Goan middle class milieu and with a shift to Mumbai, he has been adapting to urban lifestyle. Apart from writing, Aniket has also worked as an assistant directors across formats. His formal screenwriting education is from Writers Ink Lab and also from Script-Notes podcast, along with numerous workshops. But the primary learning comes from reading screenplays and watching the movies at the same time.
For the past decade, Anubhuti has worked in Digital Strategy, Transformation and Technology at India’s oldest “startup” Tata Steel, and also a pioneering voice of Diversity & Inclusion, especially trans* Inclusion at Tata as well as in Corporate India – leading to Tata Steel being a sole Indian World Economic Forum Lighthouse in both Digital and Diversity, but more importantly making it a great place to work for hundreds queer/trans people in India. On the creative side, her work involves making written and video content that engages with audiences in both traditional and social media, and giving talks (200+) across sectors, and has seen first hand the power of a good story bringing positive change. She has worked leading production houses on a documentary on her life, soon to come on an OTT, starred, written and directed short films while taking up multiple short courses on direction, writing and acting. Her genres are queer and camp horror, fantasy & comedy.
Apoorva’s foray into films was a natural transition from her many years in the Bangalore theatre scene. Her first ten-minute play, “A Breath of Sea Air” was showcased at Ranga Shankara as part of the Short + Sweet Theatre Festival, 2012. This was followed by the full-length play, “The Ghorpade Fortune”, showcased as part of The Revue Theatre Festival in 2018. Having also worked on digital ads and branded content, she is now finally ready to set foot into the weird and wonderful world of cinema. Most recently, she was the chief AD on the indie Kannada film, “Don’t Tell Mother” (currently in post-production), directed by Australian director Anoop Lokkur. A huge advocate for rich dialogue and absurd humour, Apoorva hopes her stories will make people laugh, cry and say why, perhaps all at once.
Ashmita Arjun is a writer who has worked across media from screenplay development to podcasts to theater. She has been shortlisted for the Writers Ink Screenwriting Lab and a Short Film Lab by Root.ax – trans-media accelerator. Currently, she works as a writer/director on SparxByMukeshBansal. She is interested in exploring female protagonists, gen z humor, dysfunctional family dynamics and unlikely friendships. Her narratives tread a delicate balance between personal and political translating philosophical ideologies into digestible “masala” narratives. She founded Runaway Cabaret – a performance collective and has written/directed Three And Then Some for the Erotica Theatre Festival, and The Gentlemen’s Hourglass – Longlisted – Toto Writing Awards 2020. Her educational history includes a Post-Graduate Diploma in Performance Making from Drama School Mumbai, a BA in Theatre Studies, Literature and Psychology from Christ University, and an acting/writing intensive at Stagedoor Manor, New York.
Devankur Sinha is a Mumbai/Vadodara-based filmmaker who studied Filmmaking at Whistling Woods International. As a director, his short film “Qualia” was official selection at the prestigious NID Ahmedabad’s Alpavirama Film Festival. He has worked as an assistant director on projects like “Monica Oh My Darling” and “Radhe”, additionally as a cinematographer, his feature “It’s All In Your Head” secured an official selection at the Jaipur International Film Festival. His second feature as a cinematographer, “Petals” is under post production. Most recently he was selected to be a fellow at Writer’s Ink Institute’s Screenwriting Lab. Currently undertaking the direction of his debut feature film, Devankur Sinha remains a dedicated professional in the cinematic field, continually expanding his knowledge and honing his craft.
Isha Ashta is an advertising and documentary film director with a passion for telling human stories. Her most recent documentary project tells the story of Sadam Hanjabam- an LGBTQI activist and champion of mental wellness, and is featured on episode 5 of ‘The Me You Can’t See’ – a 5-part series on mental health, streaming on Apple TV+. Graduating in Mathematics, Isha brought my appetite for numbers to devouring films. She worked as a copywriter for a year, and soon after, studied TV & Video Production at XIC, Mumbai. The female experience, identity- especially individuation and coming of age are themes Isha is most interested in exploring through her work. Exhausted by the tropes of female abjection we see on screen, Isha wants her female characters to exist in their power, their messiness, their vulnerability and trauma. She is most influenced by the writing of Ottessa Moshfegh, Ann Patchett and Emily Austin.
Kamna Mohan is an Indian writer born and raised in Dubai, UAE. Her biggest cinematic inspirations are Wong Kar-Wai, Martin Scorsese and Celine Sciamma.In 2017, she was selected as a participant in the Arab Film Studio Scriptwriting programme, by Image Nation, after which she was chosen to be in the final four for the script ‘Skin Deep’, and had an opportunity to pitch at the Dubai International Film Festival. Additionally, she has been a Producer and Art Director on two short films produced by Young Filmmakers’ Circle, ADMAF. In 2022, Kamna was accepted as a participant in the Short Film Klinik, a unique programme to develop shorts and a joint partnership between the Red Sea International Film Festival, Goethe Gulf and Film Akademie.
Naina is a writer and documentary filmmaker from Hyderabad. She started as a production executive and writer at Hyderabad-based Clown Pictures and became a PA on the Telugu indie film Season of Innocence. While she made documentaries (Children of Men), she also co-wrote ‘Quarantine’, slated to be the first virtual production in South India. Since COVID, she has worked as a creative professional at advertising firms like Nutshell and Schbang until finally quitting in 2023. She now edits music videos, makes documentaries, stars in food reels and freelances for the Times of India. From December – January, she was a writing intern at Nandita Das Initiatives and assisted Nandita Das on her feature script. She is now editing her oral-history documentary on Hyderabad, and is writing her anthology of revisionist Indian myths.
Exploring people, places, and their stories is Niladri Mukherjee’s creative interest. After earning his degree from the Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Niladri spent three years at Nirvana Films working as a director’s assistant, where he learnt that the most powerful stories come from our lived experiences. His short films, Cheshtha Procheshtha, Nine, and Do Nadiyon Ki Tehzeeb have travelled to film festivals like Simultan Arts Festival (Romania/2020), Rushes National Student Film Festival (India/2020), and Delhi International Film Festival (2020) respectively. His first short film, When The Rain Said, was acquired by Shorts TV India. In addition to being a budding writer and director of films, Niladri also dons the hat of a music director. If not doing anything related to films, he can be found at satsangs, singing Kabir bhajans.
Nischaal Sharma is a writer/director/producer who has always been crazy enough to believe that she can change the world. One way she attempts to do that is through her films. Nischhal takes inspiration from society to tell stories that reflect the reality of the world we all live in. A graduate of MetFilm School, London, she has written and directed short films and ads films in the past before she co-founded Cinelok Creative Lab, a production company. She was also the writer and director of Rimi – an award winning short film that premiered at IFFSA, Toronto 2021, IFF Stuttgart 2021, and IDSFFK, India 2022.
Pavithra Sreekumar is a writer, assistant director and script development executive living in Mumbai. She completed her undergraduate in film and creative writing from Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore. She has worked as a director’s assistant in the Hindi film ‘Bhagwan Bharose’ (2023), a 2nd AD in the Hindi film ‘Aye Zindagi’ (2022) and as a chief AD in the Hindi film ‘Minimum’ (TBR). Pavithra has also worked as a creative producer for the Marathi film ‘Toh, Ti Ani Fuji’ (TBR) and as an assistant director for the pan-Indian documentary film ‘Candidates’ – a film about the rising chess prodigies of India. She has participated in screenwriting residencies and labs like Rewrite 2.0 and Writer’s Ink. Pavithra also enjoys writing poetry and film reviews. Her poems are published in a few poetry journals and her film reviews are published on Film Companion.
Priyanka Singh left her corporate job at Google India, to enter the field of filmmaking. She joined Whistling Woods International, Mumbai and specialised in Cinematography. She has worked as an assistant cinematographer in feature films like Ugly, Bombay Talkies, Ferrari Ki Sawaari, Detective Byomkesh Bakshy. Her independent cinematography work includes Aarya Season 3, Emmy-nominated Netflix show Indian Matchmaking, Zindagi In Shorts produced by Oscar-winning Guneet Monga, FIFA women’s world cup series along with various other short films and documentaries. In 2018, She forayed into direction with her short film Maunn which won the award for Best Short Film at the Oscar-qualifying Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival.
Rohit Menon graduated with a B.A. in Economics and Math from Macalester College, in Minnesota and worked as a management consultant before changing course and choosing to attend the Toronto Film School’s Filmmaking Program iin 2008.After graduating in 2010, Rohit returned to Mumbai and started working as a freelance Assistant Director (AD) for feature films, commercials and web shows. Since 2016 he’s been a 1st AD for Hindi feature films and OTT shows for various production houses including Excel, RSVP, T-Series and YRF as well as a few international features shot in India. Currently, he has taken a break from AD duties to focus on enhancing his writing skills and nurturing ideas for future directorial projects.
Samarth Mahajan is a Mumbai-based filmmaker, passionate about telling human stories that remain invisible to the mainstream. His work includes two national award-winning documentaries – ‘Borderlands’ explores lives defined by India’s borders and ‘The Unreserved’ captures stories from general compartments of Indian Railways. He is now writing his narrative feature debut.Samarth’s films have screened across six continents to favorable reviews and have received broadcast and theatrical releases in India. His projects have also been featured in major film markets such as Marché du Film. Samarth’s commercial collaborations include brands like Vice Studios and Discovery+. His other passion is organizing food walks through the streets of Old Delhi and South Mumbai.
Shruti Sonal is a Delhi-based writer, poet and journalist who loves to tell stories in all their forms. Her poetry has been published in various anthologies, including Penguin India’s ‘Ninety-Seven Poems’, HarperCollins’ ‘The World That Belongs To Us’, and the Alipore Post’s ‘Memories on a Plate’. She has prominently written for publications such as Times of India, Scroll, The Wire, The Hindu, Film Companion and more. Her debut poetry book ‘In Which Language Do I Remember You?’ was published in December 2023 by Writers Workshop. ‘Snow’, a short revolving around loss and films, is going to be featured in Kitaab’s Best Asian Fiction of 2023. She’s also a Writers Ink Screenwriting Fellow for 2023-24 and is working on her first feature film screenplay as a part of the lab.
Sidaq Batra is a screenwriter and filmmaker from New Delhi and has worked on commissioned projects for Netflix, Sony, and TVF. Sidaq has participated in two commissioned Writer’s Rooms: Sudhir Mishra’s ‘Summer of ’77’, an 8-episode historical fiction series, and Season Two of Netflix’s ‘For Your Eyes Only’, a realistic spy-thriller. Additionally, he has written multiple spec pilots currently in the pitching stage. His work spans across genres such as family drama and romantic comedy to political drama, satire, and comedy drama. He has also written and directed three short films: ‘Antarvirodh’, ‘Hands That Don’t Talk’, and ‘Mandi Aanch’. The latter was selected in the top 3% of Netflix’s TakeTen Filmmaking Competition Season 2.
Sidharth Mathawan, is a Kashmir-born architect and now a Mumbai-based filmmaker. Starting with Production Design for projects like Midnight’s Children, Don 2, Prague, alongside ads for Apple, Google, Chivas, 100 Pipers, and more and with acclaimed directors like Wong Kar-Wai, Deepa Mehta, Farhan Akhtar, Bharat Sikka, and Emmanuel Lubeski. He is a Berlinale Talent 2010 for PD. His creative pursuits include interiors, theater sets and art, fashion & music events.
Driven by a desire to tell his own stories, he attended workshops at filmArche, Berlin, and Whistling Woods. His screenplays, “Khayali Pulao” and “The Deleted,” were selected for TorinoFilmLab, Italy (2018) and Maison Des Scénaristes, Cannes (2018). He has attended Berlinale (2010, 2014) and Cannes (2017, 2018) and the Producers Workshop at Marché du Film (2017). Sidharth’s debut short film, as director, “Analog Girl,” premiered at the Debrief Cannes in Paris (2018), followed by “The Desire for Desires” at CSAFF, Chicago (2018)
Srika Nambiar is an aspiring writer, with a penchant for storytelling that makes people feel seen and heard. She had worked as an AD on a film set between India and Singapore by filmmaker Aditya Kripalani back in 2021. However, the film was shelved because of the pandemic. She is now working as a media planner, actively seeking opportunities to switch paths and pursue her dream of telling stories. When she is not doing a desk job, she writes script, and also frequently run a film blog to stay closer to the world of cinema. Being a second-gen immigrant, Srika is passionate about Asian representation in her stories and feel strongly about bringing the magic of the South Asian diaspora to a global front.
An alumna of the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute, Triparna Maiti is an animation artist, illustrator and a writer based out of Kolkata. She has worked on multiple independent projects for clients including Amazon Prime, Netflix, Unilever and HCL. Her latest short film Neer (Water) has been an official selection at various prestigious festivals like Anifilm in Czech Republic, Monstra in Lisbon, Filmschool Fest Munich and the Oscar qualifying BISFF in India. Triparna is also a visiting faculty for animation courses at Atlas SkillTech College in Bombay. Triparna’s interests revolve around exploring complex emotions and indigenous storytelling through the powerful medium of animation.
Vardaan Malhotra is a cinematographer by profession. He completed his diploma in cinematography from Whistling Woods International, After completing his diploma, he got the opportunity to assist Anay Goswami and Siddharth Diwan as assistant cinematographer. After learning about being behind the camera Vardaan moved to Mumbai permanently to become a full time screenwriter and cinematographer.
You can better understand him as a nerd with a quirky eye & dangling many commercial story related ideas in the head.
Vibha Kulkarni is an Indian director and writer based in Los Angeles for whom storytelling is a tool for self-discovery. Vibha explored a range of storytelling media for a decade, from Fine Art, Performance Art, and Interactive Art to Theater, Indian Classical Dance, and Poetry. As a misfit herself, torn between the lens of Indian traditions and Western ideologies, Vibha’s stories are about women, teenagers, and children learning to embrace their authentic selves. Vibha is an MFA Directing Alum at the American Film Institute Conservatory and an M.Des New Media alum at the National Institute of Design, India.
Vidit Singh works across the mediums of film and theatre, often attempting to blend the practices of both. He is currently working as a Media Analyst and lives in Mumbai. In 2023, he graduated from Ashoka University. As a student, he was active in the college’s theatre scene and directed two Indian adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays. Vidit is also a literary translator, having translated Varun Grover’s short story ‘Karejwa’, published by Commonwealth Writers.
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