From Bollywood to Diwali, Indians in Prague shed light on a growing community

It was almost not to be. At the closure of last year's Prague Indian Film Festival, co-founder and art director Radim Špaček figured it could be a good opportunity to finish with a bang and "our heads held high", exactly 20 years after the adventure first started.

But after discussing it with the rest of the organizing team, he discovered that everyone was on board to continue. "I also realized that if we stopped organizing the festival, all of us would probably not be able to meet so often," he told Expats.cz. "The idea of seeing less of my crazy friends was not pleasant", he explains. "They mean the world to me."

So despite the countless obstacles involved in putting together such an event, the stress and constant doubts, the financial costs and emotional toll, Radim and his  "crazy friends" went at it again.

Running from Thursday to Saturday at Kino Světozor, the now 21st edition of the Prague Indian Film Festival brings half a dozen carefully curated – courtesy of Radim and his team – movies to show the best of what Bollywood has to offer, mixing genres, topics and eras.

As we meet a few days before the opening ceremony of the festival, Radim explains how it all started, more than two decades ago, through his friendship and collaboration with Hanka Nedvědová, a Tamil language student, and Czech-Nepalese dancer and choreographer Sangita Shresthova.

“We all realized we were somewhat 'homesick' for India," Radim, a FAMU-educated film director whose first trip to the south-Asian country dates to the late 1990s, says. The trio then set out to organize small screenings of Indian movies to indulge in their nostalgia, some in FAMU and some in NoD, situated just above Roxy.

"We just created small posters to advertise the screenings and thought there would be 10, maybe 20 of us, max," he tells Expats.cz. "But we were shocked; it was a big success. More than 100 people came to one of the screenings, for instance".

Radim admits that his first experience with Indian cinema, when he travelled there as a student, met with mixed results, to say the least.  "I didn't understand or like it at all. It was love at first sight with the country and the people, but with cinema itself, it look a longer time," he says, adding that it was during this very first edition that he fell in love with Indian cinema.

"The songs were talking to me. I started understanding the problems depicted there, the social problematics and issues quite specific to India," but that can also find a more universal echo.

With gusto and growing expertise, the team of the Prague Indian Film Festival set out to evangelize Czech audiences on the topic, allowing foreign viewers to watch films of a type they had never seen before or Indian expats to come together far from home and give them, year after year, a taste of home. Traditional dance, food, and other programs commonly accompany the festival, which has grown to be a can't-miss gathering for anyone interested in Indian culture.

More than 20 years on, the situation is much different, Radim explains. "People generally go less and less to the cinema, and virtually all the movies are available online, on streaming or VOD platforms. This means that many, especially Indians, have already seen the movies we pick."

As a result, the share of Indian expats has somewhat dropped in the overall festival attendance, Radim says, but many are still looking forward to the event. Rimjhim, a 29-year-old Indian expat in Prague, tells us she's gotten tickets to see the immortal Kabhi Khushi Khabie Gham on Saturday, despite already having seen it countless times – although she admits that the fact that Indian superstar actor Shah Rukh Khan plays in it might have something to do with it.

And there are also still many Czechs and foreigners coming every year to either discover for the first time the scent, colors and sounds of Bollywood, or bask in a genre they already know and have learned to appreciate.

Compared to 20 years ago, when the festival's main goal was to show viewers new and unusual films that have now become more accessible and common knowledge, Radim and his team now seek to offer a carefully curated selection of high-quality films spotlighting how Bollywood has changed and moved away from the cliches and stereotypes many viewers might still hold to be true.

 "Bollywood is changing. There are much more thrillers and detective stories, movies addressing difficult social topics. They're also very good in TV series now, their quality is comparable to the best Western productions," he explains.

He notes that by many accounts, Czech and possibly other European audiences are quite conservative in how they view Indian cinema, still believing it's all about "dancing and romantic plots and happy endings or just crazy B or C-class action movies with weird stunts."

"Of course, we try to show those too sometimes. But in the mass of movies coming out of India, it can be very difficult to find the good ones actually worth seeing," explains Radim, who confides he's once again going there at the end of the year for several months "with no return ticket yet."

While central to Prague’s Indian community life, the film festival is not the only cultural celebration of its kind. This year, the festival falls on the same dates as Diwali, the popular Hindu festival of lights, and a host of related events will be held in Prague to mark the occasion, including a Bollywood party hosted this Saturday by Indian DJ Deepak at the Chapeau Rouge.

"When I first came to Prague in the early 1990s, the Indian community was very small," explains Bhagwant Sandhu, who has since set up shop and has been living in Czechia for more than 30 years. "Everybody knew everybody."

"I was also quite an exotic thing for Czechs," he says, recalling instances when intrigued passersby pointed the finger at him or, in more worrying but sadly common cases, when he and other Indians had to avoid taking the metro in order not to be harrassed.  "Racism was horrible in the 1990s, but it's gotten much better," he claims.

The situation has changed dramatically since, and about 10,000 Indians – including some 6,000 in Prague alone – now live in the country, a fast-growing cohort consisting mainly of students, IT professionals or business managers working in international companies.

Bhagwant is one of the founding members of the Indian Community in Czech Republic (ICCR, not to be confused with the Indian Council for Cultural Relations), a non-profit founded in 2019 to bring the growing Indian expat community of Prague, Brno and elsewhere together.

"There were other similar organizations before," Bhagwant tells Expats.cz, "but we wanted ours to be truly democratic, open to everybody. We wanted to do something different, not just concentrate on Indian culture, but help integrate the Indian communities and Indian families in Czech local life."

As Bhagwant and Madhu Kulkarni – another founding member of ICCR who has been living in Prague for more than a dozen years – explain, their organization has thrived and grown exponentially with the size of the Indian community itself.

From musical performances to running and trekking events, from Indian public holiday celebrations to yoga sessions or the more recent competitions of carrom – a popular Indian tabletop game – ICCR prides itself on the diversity of its offer, which is open to all. "Anyone can come to us with an idea. If it can be done, we'll do it," Bhagwant says.  "That's how it's supposed to be," echoes Madhu.

Held since the first year around the month of September, Experience India remains their biggest annual event, bringing everything from foodstuff and drinks, handcrafted goods, traditional clothing, or dance performances to the delight of Prague residents.

"We also have a strong focus on Indian children, many of whom were born in the Czech Republic," explains Madhu, "and sometimes lack a connection with and knowledge about India. We try to introduce them back into Indian culture."

Through the activities of its five founding members and small team of about half a dozen volunteers, ICCR is also involved in charity work. "Whenever we can do something for society, we do it," Bhagwant explains, including during Covid times – when they crowdfunded and shipped medical equipment to hard-hit India – or after the tornado that struck Moravian villages in 2021.

ICCR teams were also on the Polish and Slovak borders to greet the thousands of Indian expats forced to flee Ukraine after Russia launched its full scale invasion almost three years ago.

Indian expats in need of help, translation or simply advice for practical purposes – going to the doctor, dealing with Czech bureaucracy, etc. - can also turn to the NGO, Bhagwant and Madhu say, reminding that they have an email helpline created for this exact purpose.

"Language is the main barrier for Indians living in Prague," Madhu says, "That's why we try to assist them." Whenever there is a problem, people show up with big hearts, Bhagwant says, grateful for the long way they’ve come in only five years – and looking forward to many more years of the same.

Prague’s Indian Film Festival is entering its 21st year this week, continuing to exhibit a selection of Indian cinema at Kino Světozor from tomorrow, Oct. 31, to Nov. 2. This year's festival coincides with the Indian celebration of Diwali.