US filmmaker makes documentary on farmers protest

BATHINDA: Taking the farmer protests against the agricultural marketing laws to further heights, a 75-minute documentary ‘Declaration of a revolution’, has been made in USA, documenting the farmers’ six months while up in arms against the central government at the borders of Delhi.
Even though the documentary is yet to be officially released, it has been invited to be screened at 8 different international film festivals across the world. The documentary goes through various details of farmer struggle as to how and why the need arose for the protest, why farmers are opposing the three contentious laws and how determined are the farmers to take the fight to its logical conclusion.
Monica Gill, US- based actress of Punjabi origin is playing a pivotal role. The image of 31 years old Jagsir Singh of village Pandher in Barnala, who kept on raising slogans even while his entire face soaked in blood due to lathi blows during the farmer tractor parade on January 26, 2021, has been used as central point of the documentary.
Documentary has been invited to be screened at Montreal international film festival, Canadian cinematography awards, Tokyo lift-off film festival, Turkey Anatolia international film festival, Chicago Indie film awards, iconic images film festival, Golden wheat awards and Hollywood venus awards.
Going into the details of the documentary, Monica Gill in an email interview, tells TOI that when attempting to raise awareness on the Farmers Protest happening in India, she kept hitting road bumps.
"Our director, Harbaldeep Singh, quickly realised that in order to reach more people, we needed a bigger platform. That is where the idea for a documentary arose”.