Bapi
Ranita Roy | India
Every day after waking up in the morning, I go to my father's room full of hope to see him standing in front of me, like he did in the past. But still he is paralyzed.
While unemployment is a heavily reported topic, the stories often fail to go beyond statistics. Joblessness and economic decline have consequences for both the individual and the family unit. Since 2019 I have witnessed the untold and the unseen side of the story, experiencing the helpless situation of my father and how his voice is getting suppressed to an extreme.
At the age of 57, my father, Ganesh Chandra Roy, lost the job that had sustained him for 12 years. This provoked him with massive anxiety and depression until he became a complete blank. Already a challenging situation, that same year he suffered two back to back strokes that left the left side of his body paralyzed.
My father’s experience and my family’s struggle is the story of many families facing economic decline and unemployment world-wide. Through this story, I want to shed light on the untold effects of the relationship between poverty and health.
“When I shared this project, many people could relate with their own life events, and shared their own stories with me. It’s important to start a conversation. I try to tell large stories in a subtle way where we can touch someone’s heart and heal together. Not all the time we can change problems on a larger scale, but we can create a small impact in humans’ hearts which leads to changing someone else’s thinking process.”
These still images are part of a short film that will premier within the coming year.