By Evan Walsh | Community Advocate | United States |
REGION – On March 25, 2020, ISIS raided a Sikh place of worship in Kabul, Afghanistan, killing 25 people.
ISIS’s attack was just one of the many attacks on religious minorities dating back to 1996. Facing religious persecution, religious minorities — Sikh, Hindu, and Jewish people — were forced to leave their longtime homes and find asylum.
While ISIS’s resurgence was well-documented by mainstream media, stories of the exodus of religious minorities in the region remained largely untold. Now, an ambitious group of local students are ready to put the immigration of religious minorities into the limelight.
After months of work, the group produced “Baywatana: The Untold Stories of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus,” which delves into people’s emigration from Afghanistan and journey to the Western World.
Baywatana — which means “without country” in Pashto — was produced by six teenage students from Central Massachusetts: Aekem Singh, Sahej Singh, Jaskeerat Singh, Jasratan Chopra, Tanisha Kaur Kapoor and Suner Kaur Chopra. The students attend Shrewsbury High School, Worcester Academy, St. John’s High School and Algonquin Regional High School.
The group was mentored by Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Harbaldeep Singh.
The group operates under the name Nishkam TV, a nonprofit founded by Harbaldeep Singh in 2016. Nishkam — which means “selfless” — is an online television channel created in partnership with the New England Sikh Study Circle, New England Khalsa School and Westborough Gurdwara Sahib. According to its website, the group focuses on “building [dialogue], increasing understanding, and promoting interactions between different faiths and cultures to ultimately bring us closer as one humanity and enhance our lives.”
Nishkam TV students work on one of seven “teams” in the organization: the production team, the content team, the talent team, the marketing team, the newsletter team, the social media team and the production design team.
As Aekem Singh described it, it’s not all about filmmaking and the camera. He’s a member of the content team, whose work involves research and conducting interviews.
“For me, when I go into the future I want something involved with writing and research and being around people. I really use what I’m passionate about when working with Nishkam TV. I put my interests in that,” said Aekem Singh.
In 2021, Nishkam TV produced “Declaration of a Revolution,” which followed the farmers’ protests in India. The documentary won awards and entered film festivals. The group’s sophomore documentary, entitled “SEVA,” highlights Sikhs during the COVID-19 pandemic. SEVA was recently sold to PBS.
For the full story, click here, Local students share global stories with documentary (Community Advocate, Dec 10, 2023).
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(Asia Samachar, x 2023)
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