In ‘Election Diaries 2024’, the intricate footwork involved in the dance of democracy

In 2007, contributors to the documentary series Why Democracy? visited several countries to understand various facets of “rule by the people”. Documentary filmmaker and academic Lalit Vachani directed the Indian instalment, In Search of Gandhi. Vachani is now among the producers of Election Diaries 2024, a set of documentaries about the Lok Sabha election that gave the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party a third term in power.

Election Diaries 2024 revisits one of the most divisive, closely fought and crucial elections in recent memory. While the election’s outcome is known, the documentaries try to make sense of the BJP’s inability to win a majority in the Lok Sabha. This required the Hindutva party to form a coalition government.

The themes of creeping majoritarianism, open Islamophobia and the BJP’s threats to rewrite the Constitution hang over stories from Kerala to Bengal and Karnataka to Meghalaya. The nine directors capture the pageantry, the rallies and speeches, the issues that are debated but also sidestepped.

Vachani and Srirupa Roy serve as producers and Ridhima Mehra and Tulika Srivastava as executive producers for the project, which was backed by the Centre for Modern Indian Studies at the University of Gottingen in Germany. Six of the nine titles are being screened as a package at the International Documentary & Short Film...

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