DRUGS AND PRAYERS - INDIAN PSYCHIATRY IN THE REALM OF SAINTS
Germany/India, 2009, 57 min
Helene Basu
30.01.2010 18:25
The Sufi shrine of Mira Datar in India is large pilgrimage centre specialising in healing possession madness/mental illness. Recently, it has also become a site of experimenting with new forms of community care in the mental health sector. The NGO „Altruist“ facilitates communication between the mental health department, shrine dignitaries, psychiatrists and patients suffering from diverse kinds of mental troubles who seek help from the saint. Under the heading of „Dava and Dua“ Altruists promotes psychiatric services at the shrine parallel to the cures of possession illnesses offered by ritual specialists. The film documents interactions between different actors at the shrine (patients-psychiatrists, psychiatrists-ritual specialists, patients-ritual specialists), listens to the stories of afflicted persons and presents diverse views on the presumed causes of mental illness as well on the benefit or non-benefit of medicine and/or ritual practices as perceived by patients and their relatives.
Language of dialogues: Hindi and Gujarati
Language of subtitles: English
The documentary film is a part of a multimedia study which consists of visual and editorial parts. Apart from the film, the DVD offers thematically digested shots recorded in scope of the research and a photogallery. Visual as well as editorial part connects possibilities of verbal and visual language and is bound to serve as an interception of the complexity of the observed march and to the representation of the dance as a cultural context. The complexity should help to reveal and deliver the connotation of the traditional event in today´s local society. The documentary can be publicised separately as well and its informational value does not depend on the supporting text of the multimedia study.
