Naheed ki Katha (20min, 2001)

Urdu w English subtitles. Final Project for Goldsmiths College MA TV Documentary (tutor Tony Dowmunt). Filmed in London and Lahore, with archival material from Pakistan and the UK.
This documentary records the struggle of Pakistan's finest exponent of the classical dance known as 'kathak', to be able to dance in Pakistan. Banned from appearing on TV after Gen Zia's military coup of 1979 and subsequent 'Islamisation' of the laws and media, she had to move to England in order to continue dancing. Naheed insists that she is not an activist and that dance is merely her own expression. Yet 'Naheed's Story' is that of a life which stands as a metaphor for Pakistan's little-recorded struggle for secularism and pluralism, freedom of expression and women's rights. (Thanks to Nahid Siddiqui for allowing me to make this video public now).