Filmmaker Aditya Kripalani looks at eve-teasing with a twist through Tottaa Pataaka Item Maal

Filmmaker Aditya Kripalani’s debut film Tikli And Laxmi Bomb created quite a buzz in the film festival circuit — both national and international. It won several awards including the Berlin Independent Film Festival award for the Best Feature and the UK Asian Film Festival award for Best Picture for Gender Equality (both in 2018). Even as the young filmmaker is soaking in this success, he is already on the festival round of his second feature film, Tottaa Pataaka Item Maal.

The film is the official selection in the feature film category at the 17th Garden State Film Festival in New Jersey. His first film showcased the dark underbelly of Mumbai, where a small part of the sex trade was run by women, for women. In his second film, which is set in Delhi, a group of women get into an altercation with their eve teaser and kidnap him. They keep him hostage, harass him physically and mentally and threaten himwith gang rape. “It’s not something that they plan,” says the filmmaker explaining the plot. “They all meet in a shared cab and have their own journeys and paths to take. But one thing leads to another and the only idea they have in mind is to break the guy’s mind,” he adds further.

These are four women from different backgrounds — a social media expert, a cop, a martial arts trainer and a cab services owner. Aditya’s first film showed women in a different light and this one too comes with a twist. When asked about why he makes such films, he says, “I want to tell stories about equality and this is an attempt at that. It’s about women who want men to experience the fear of being raped — not one day, but every day.” The title of the film is words men in North India use to eve tease women. Next on the agenda for Aditya is a film about a modern day interpretation of the friendship between Goddesses Kaali and Saraswati.