Airing Dirty Laundry in Public... Toilets

Q2P
dir: Paromita Vohra

No, it's not another acronym for an impending computer doom. Nor, is it a craigslist advertisement for a golden shower. Q2P is, however, a documentary film that examines the issue of public toilets for women in Mumbai and New Delhi, India.

Screened as a part of the Indian Film Festival at the Arclight Theater in Hollywood, Q2P was conceived and directed by Paromita Vohra. A Mumbai-native, Vohra's motivation behind making the documentary stemmed from her curiosity of the lack of women's public toilets in Mumbai. She also commented that it interested her "because everyone pees," and therefore everyone can relate to the subject.

Throughout the documentary, Vohra travels through various districts in Mumbai, from train stations to busy streets asking shop owners and pedestrians (mostly men) where she would find a women's public toilet. Their answers, sometimes comical ("women go at home") and other times unfortunate (quizzical looks of realization that there were no women's toilets in the area) highlight the social position of women in contemporary India.

Her documentary successfully underscores the gender inequalities that exist in India. While men notoriously urinate in public places throughout India, women aren't allowed to partake in this action. Vohra investigates why when speaking with a group of Marathi men in a dhaba [restaurant] in Mumbai. Casually asking them why women aren't allowed to urinate in public, one man sniggered and responded: "our [Marathi] women are cultured... if women went to the bathroom in the streets, there would be mayhem."

His underlying suggestion, which has been argued throughout many feminist readings of Indian gender relations, implies that women are seen as the emblem of the state. Women are the carriers of national culture and honor and therefore must be domesticated, unlike the men, who are allowed to flow freely in public. While Vohra does not explicitly dive into this dialogue, she uses the toilet example to highlight gender inequality for mainstream public audiences.

In fact, what was most disturbing about the documentary was the discussion surrounding toilets for girl students in government schools. Because many schools have a limited amount of running water, many students don't use the bathrooms. While the boys can go outside, the girls often times "hold on" all day, which can lead to urinary and other infections and often times terminate their educations because of the lack of toilets.

While the film was successful in bringing to light gender differences, there are also some shortcomings. Firstly, the fifty-three minute documentary could have been cut a good amount. Marketed as a film about Mumbai public toilets, Vohra spends a lot of time in New Delhi talking about public toilets. While this is good in stressing the national problem of toilets, the documentary would have been just as strong if she confined her area of study to Mumbai. Additionally, it would be beneficial for Vohra to talk about real solutions. She talks to women and urban planners about the situation and shows some solutions to the problem [such as the "magic cone:" a plastic tube women can hold up to their urethras so they can stand and urinate], there is a lack of likely solutions discussed for the problem.

The audience reaction to the film was positive overall. While the film was seemingly geared toward an activist-oriented audience and people invested in social injustices, the audience at the festival was comprised of young hipsters and Bollywoodphiles. Some left in the middle after the numerous and long shots of public bathrooms sprinkled with feces, yet the majority appeared moved. The film can overall be used as a springboard to discuss women's issues in India through a mainstream media. While these issues are discussed at length in the academy, it is important to raise these issues through other avenues that may increase awareness of the issue and inspire moviegoers to get involved in projects.
     
For a woman like Vohra, who has been involved in numerous other films about women issues, this film will add to her list of social issues she has helped to bring to the surface. If women are to be held in prime positions of honor and culture in contemporary India as the government and many men assume, after seeing the grueling conditions women survive in Vohra's film, I believe they should be allowed to drop their saris, squat and enjoy a scenic city view. After all, they are just as good as men. --Siddarth Puri

Dirty Laundry
dir: Sanjeev Chatterjee

With more than half the seats empty, I sat there in the dark theatre excited to be attending the Indian Film Festival for the first time. However, although director Sanjeev Chatterjee's Dirty Laundry was a brave attempt to explore struggles facing Indians in South Africa, the next 42 minutes were not only disappointing but tinged with confusion and an excruciating headache, caused both by the film and the intensely bright screen.  In order to explore various issues surrounding the role of the Indian community in the South African apartheid, Dirty Laundry includes interviews with Ashwin Desai, Laloo Chiba, the Jowuddin family, the Chand family. However, the film fails to familiarize the audience with the history of the South African apartheid before diving into its connection with Indians, identity, and recent religious tensions in India. As a result, the film lacks coherence and organization as it jumps from the Jowuddin family's heated political living room conversations to the imprisonment of revolutionaries of Indian origin alongside Nelson Mandela during the apartheid to recent religious riots taking place in Gujarat, India. Unfortunately, without the focus, Chatterjee's film fails to convey the history and depth of the issue at hand. --Reena Rana