Srinagar
On the 34 death anniversary of Maqbool Butt, the founder of Jammu Kashmir Liberation front, a documentary on his life titled “Bring Him Back” was released for public. The film is directed by Kashmir based journalist and editor Fahad Shah and produced by Talat Butt, Co-produced by RåFILM Sweden and JKTV Manchester.
The film was shot over a period of three years from 2013 to 2015, all shot in Kashmir. It was first released in London at the University of Westminster in 2015 and later on screened at the Humboldt-University of Berlin, Lund University of Sweden, British Parliament, This is the first time that the filmmakers have released the film worldwide for the public.
The film follows his 84-year-old mother, Shahmali Begum, 84, who has been campaigning to get her son’s mortal remains back to Kashmir for last 34 years. Butt was a prominent leader of Kashmir’s resistance movement, demanding independence from India and Pakistan. After imprisoning him, the Indian government hanged him on 11 February 1984 in the Tihar Jail of New Delhi in India on the charges of murder. Without informing his family anything about him, his body was buried in the jail compound.
The film’s director, Fahad Shah, who was educated in London, is a journalist and editor currently based in Kashmir, who started his work from Greater Kashmir newspaper over a decade ago and frequently writes for international publications. He is the founding editor of The Kashmir Walla magazine and the editor of the anthology Of Occupation and Resistance: Writings from Kashmir (2013). The producer Talat Bhat is a Sweden based Kashmiri activist, documentary filmmaker, and trade union campaigner, who has a Masters degree in Media Production and is researching the impacts of new media technologies in conflict zones.
“In this film, his mother is followed while she talks about his childhood, struggle and the hardships during his political career. She goes from pillar to post to seek support in her campaign and also writes a letter to a President of India. She travels to different holy shrines to pray for her campaign to bring back her sons mortal remains to Kashmir before she dies,” the filmmakers said.
