The story of Delhi’s apocalyptic air and its escalating communal violence is woven together by an unlikely figure – the black kite. In the toxic opacity of Delhi’s air, black kites routinely collide into buildings and drop out of the sky.
Two Muslim brothers, Nadeem and Saud, operate a healing centre for kites out of their tiny basement. The brothers treat thousands of kites from their basement each month, because these birds are rejected from established bird hospitals as their predatory meat diet is seen as “non-vegetarian.”
This is the story of one Muslim family and their relationship with these birds, set against the backdrop of India’s sharp turn towards Hindu majoritarianism. Through them we get a definitive snapshot of contemporary India, and its surreal environmental and political absurdities.
The Asia Pacific Screen Academy expresses its respect for and acknowledgement of the South East Queensland Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. We pay our respects to the Traditional Owners of country, including the custodial communities on whose land works are created and celebrated by the Asia Pacific Screen Awards. We acknowledge the continuing connection to land, waters and communities. We also pay our respects to Elders, past and present. We recognise the integral role Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and First Nations peoples continue to play in storytelling and celebration spaces.
