Prisoners of Conscience

An important historical record of a tumultuous period in India's recent political history, PRISONERS OF CONSCIENCE focuses on the State of Emergency imposed by Indira Ghandi from June, 1975 to March, 1977.

During the Emergency over 100,000 people were arrested without charge and imprisoned without trial. But political prisoners existed before the Emergency, and they continued to exist even after it was over.

"The result of a few years of painstaking work... PRISONERS OF CONSCIENCE is a bold attempt to fight against the lies the system in India wishes to propagate on the issue of political prisoners. It is real, authentic, and part of the movement. ...needs to be shown widely." - Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars

"[PRISONERS OF CONSCIENCE], made under appalling conditions, displayed a courage never shown before in the documentary movement in India." - Business Weekly Standard

"The power of the film derives from its restraint. Restraint does not imply a reluctance to state facts. The film does that only too clearly." - The Times of India

"A paean to those in the past and those in the present who have not hesitated to struggle for a just society and who, in the process, may have been imprisoned or even lost their lives." - Critical Asian Studies

** 2003 Association for Asian Studies Conference Film Festival


45 minutes / B & W / 1978