In the remote islands of Lakshadweep, fishing is not just a livelihood – it is an identity. Through the voices of fishers, the film traces the fragile balance between people and the sea. It explores how fishers practise pole and line fishing, a selective, low-impact method that uses marine resources responsibly, why baitfish are vital to the system, and how knowledge and patience once safeguarded the fishery’s future. It also highlights new challenges: unsustainable shifts such as night fishing, rising fuel costs, declining demand, and threats to coastal commons At its heart, Misrav is about more than fishing. It’s about the choices the fishers of Lakshadweep face between tradition, survival, and sustainability. By bringing fishers and government together, co-management can secure a future where Lakshadweep’s resources continue to sustain livelihoods, traditions, and ecosystems for generations to come.
Watch the documentary here.
Bordering the hot Tamil hinterland, the Palk Bay on the southern Indian coast is a shallowest expanse of sea. Its natural and cultural wealth is legendary but is fast vanishing, from this space and from memory. Fishing Palk Bay, a 29-minute documentary film explores the breadth and depth of human ingenuity, skill and even the paradoxes that Palk Bay’s fishing communities produce each day, through the extraordinary science and art that is fishing.
The film was directed by Saravanakumar of Evanescence Studios and produced by Aarthi Sridhar of Dakshin Foundation. The underwater sequences were planned and shot by Umeed Mistry. The film has been screened at the Vatavaran Film Festival of 2017, at the Moving Waters Film Festival in 2016 and multiple screenings across India. Fishing Palk Bay was produced with funding from Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, New Delhi as part of the CMPA (Conservation and Sustainable Management of Coastal and Marine Protected Areas) project. Dakshin Foundation partnered with Evanescence Studios, the grant recipients, to research and produce the film.
Watch the documentary here.
Shifting Sands is a short film that tells the story of our ever changing coastlines, the need for regular monitoring of these dynamic coasts and how community initiatives can help generate much needed data on our evolving beaches.
– Directed by Priyanjana Dutta
– Produced by Dakshin Foundation
– Supported by the Duleep Matthai Nature Conservation Trust
Watch the Documentary on Dakshin’s Youtube channel: here
The stories of women living along diverse landscapes of Odisha’s 480 km coastline are that of coping with their circumstances and of struggles of survival. Confronting not just an overall scenario of depleting fish catch and unsustainable fisheries, women located along biodiversity rich habitats also have to contend with the fickleness of legal conservation restrictions which have dealt a severe blow to their livelihoods and way of life. Chronicles of Oblivion, directed by journalist and filmmaker Priyanjana Dutta, unearths the impacts of sea turtle conservation seen through the eyes of women fishworkers of Odisha. These women’s stories guide the narrative of the film revealing the unequal and invisible world of women fishworkers from Kendrapara and Ganjam, and the unaccounted labour of simultaneously coping with conservation and development impacts.
Funded by the Duleep Matthai Nature Conservation Trust, and produced by Dakshin Foundation, this short film won the Livelihoods Award and the Best Editing Award at the CMS Vatavaran Environment and Wildlife Film Festival and Forum, 2014.
Watch the movie on Dakshin’s Youtube channel: here