“DEI” is how we frame the subject in corporate spaces. But the impact of diversity, equity and inclusion goes well beyond boardrooms and hiring practices. DEI is also a valuable and vibrant framework through which we understand storytelling—to ask which stories are told in the media, how are they being told, and by whom. 

It can acquire added force for non-fiction formats like documentaries, which have the potential to shape public consciousness through real stories.

Since 2012, the award-winning filmmaker Pavitra Chalam, together with CEO-director Akshay Shankar, have been striving to make inclusion the heart of their non-fiction storytelling through their production house Curley Street Media, which is headquartered in Bengaluru. Pavitra, an alumna of the New York Film Academy, is known for films that centre marginalised voices, including “Khushboo,” which won the Ability Media International (AMI) Award in 2010. Akshay made his directorial debut with “Two Feet To Fly” which was honoured as an official selection at the Auckland International Film Festival in 2017. He later co-directed the acclaimed campaign #HowWillWeRespond, focused on women’s safety in India. 

Pavitra and Akshay co-directed “Rooting for Roona,” a Netflix original documentary about the story of a child named Roona who suffered from hydrocephalus which won the Women is Film’s Finishing Fund Grant at the Sundance Film Festival.

In this conversation with Lab member Pulakita Mayekar, Pavitra and Akshay discuss their journey with Curley Street, how they approach storytelling with care and sensitivity, and what a DEI framework looks like in the world of documentary filmmaking; especially when the subject of the documentary is a person with disability.

(Editor’s Note: This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.)

How did you start making films and what drew you to stories of people with disabilities in particular? 

Pavitra: I began making films in 2003, through a youth peace initiative between India and Pakistan. But my first encounter with disability came much earlier when I was in the 11th grade, during an internship at a special school (editor’s note: this refers to schools for students with disabilities). I walked in as a teenager unsure of what to expect, and walked out with something cracked open inside of me. The children I met were radiant, fierce in their honesty, and fearless in their affection. There was no filter, no performance—only the raw, powerful beauty of being fully themselves. I never forgot that feeling. It changed me. 

In 2010, I made my first film about children with complex needs—“Khushboo.” That film went on to win the Ability Media International Award in London. And with it came clarity. These were the stories we needed to tell; stories pushed to the margins, but overflowing with talent, tenderness, fire, and truth. 

Two years later, I founded Curley Street, a film production house built on a single, urgent belief: that cinema can change the way we see. That same year, I directed “Indelible,” my first feature documentary. It followed the lives of seven extraordinary individuals with Down syndrome across India. Making that film changed everything. In the way they lived and loved, we witnessed a kind of truth that most films never touch. It became clear that our role wasn’t to explain or interpret their lives, it was simply to create the space for the world to meet them. In their own voices. 

And from the very beginning, that has been our deepest commitment: to honour presence over pathology. To celebrate spirit, not stereotype.  

Akshay: Films have always cast a spell on me. Even as a child, I was surprised by how much emotion I had buried inside me that would surface while watching a film. My mother was the principal of a special education school in Cochin, and after enduring my overly dramatic tantrums each morning, she decided to take me along with her. For three years, that school became my world. Many of my first friends were children with different disabilities, and all I remember is having the best time and feeling deeply attached to them. 

Later in school, I found myself drawn to theatre and storytelling. But it was only after four years in investment banking that I decided to take the plunge into filmmaking. I wanted to give people what films had given me—a self‑education in empathy and a visceral sense of wonder. So, I quit my job, ready to move to Mumbai. 

Instead, I met Pavitra, the first documentary filmmaker I’d ever known. Her passion for social‑issue storytelling answered a question I’d been carrying for years: how can filmmaking make a real-world impact? Through stories of people the world often overlooks, I felt a deep sense of purpose, an opportunity to express myself while learning from lives very different from my own. 

How do you approach representation of people with disabilities to ensure that the subjects are not reduced to common tropes? How do you avoid the ‘able-bodied gaze’ in your visual and narrative choices? 

Pavitra and Akshay: It always starts with presence. Before we pick up the camera, we spend time, often a lot of it, just listening. Eating together. Playing with children. Laughing at the everyday things. We don’t arrive with a script. We arrive with curiosity, humility, and time. The time part is key. From a production budget perspective, we would rather sacrifice expensive camera equipment in favour of an extra day with our heroes.  

Our visual approach is deeply intentional. We shoot at eye level. We allow silences. We don’t chase inspiration, we hold space for reality, in all its texture. At the end of the day, our hope is simple: that when someone watches the film, they feel as if they’ve simply spent time with our hero, unfiltered, unhurried, and real, just as we did when the camera wasn’t rolling.    

Auteur theory traditionally celebrates the singular creative vision of the director. How do you reconcile that idea with a collaborative, subject-centred approach, especially when telling stories from marginalised communities like those with disabilities? 

Pavitra and Akshay: We don’t believe in the myth of the lone genius in our kind of storytelling. Documentary, especially the kind we make, is inherently collaborative. Our creative vision is shaped by every interaction—every conversation around a kitchen table, every glance exchanged behind the camera, every quiet truth shared off-the-record.  

As filmmakers, we hold the frame. We bring structure, rhythm, and intuition. But the heart of the story belongs to the people living it. And so, we share authorship, always. We let our films be shaped by surprise, by consent, by collaboration. It’s not a dilution of creative vision; it’s the deepest expression of it. 

When you’re working with communities that have historically been misrepresented or silenced, this approach isn’t just ethical—it’s essential. 

While making Rooting for Roona, which moments made you grapple with creative or ethical questions given how dynamic the situation on-ground was and the sensitive nature of the story? 

Pavitra and Akshay: One of the biggest creative and ethical challenges we faced while making “Rooting for Roona” was how emotionally invested we became in the outcome of her journey. From the very beginning, we weren’t just documenting, we were deeply hopeful that Roona would receive the right medical and surgical interventions to give her a chance at a fuller life: to walk, to talk, to simply be a child. 

When Roona and her parents moved to Delhi for treatment, it was amid an intense media storm. Journalists had swarmed in to capture this sensational image of a child with an extraordinarily large head. But once they had their headline, they left. And what remained were two teenage parents from a small village, completely out of their depth, alone, overwhelmed by doctors, and facing a language barrier they didn’t know how to navigate. 

Because we were always there, and because we spoke Bengali, we naturally became the bridge. We translated between the doctors and the parents; especially when fear, confusion, or difficult decisions arose. It was never our place to make choices on their behalf, and we were very conscious of that. But we did feel a responsibility to make sure they had access — to care, to information, and to the ability to ask questions and be heard. 

So, while we never inserted ourselves into the decision-making, we tried to create access. We facilitated funding, helped them understand medical processes, and ensured they were not lost in translation, literally or emotionally. 

The hardest part was knowing when to step in and when to step back. There were moments we disagreed with a choice, or feared the implications, but we had to remain observational rather than directive. 

And in the end, as the audience knows, Roona passed away. 

Was the final surgery delayed? Perhaps it was. Did we know that the window for intervention was narrowing? Yes, we did. And we gently tried to communicate the medical realities to her parents. But they were young, and they were hopeful. In their eyes, Roona was getting better, smiling more, responding more, and they believed there was still time. They wanted to wait. They needed to wait. 

We saw it differently. We felt the urgency. We worried that waiting might cost her dearly. But even in that moment, we knew that the choice could never be ours. Because ultimately, it was their journey with Roona. Not ours. 

Telling Roona’s story with honesty meant allowing space for the messiness, the heartbreak, and the unknowns. It meant advocating quietly, supporting respectfully, and letting the story unfold as truthfully as we could. That was our biggest challenge and our deepest responsibility. 

How do you approach representation and DEI in your hiring practices — both on set and in the writers’ room or post-production team? How do you create accessible and equitable work environments for collaborators with disabilities? 

Pavitra and Akshay: When it comes to representation and DEI in our hiring practices, we’re constantly learning and trying to do better. Gender diversity is something we’ve been intentional about from the start. Across our productions, we’ve consistently aimed for a near 50:50 gender split both on set and in post-production. 

“Rooting for Roona”, for instance, was led by a predominantly female crew, from one of the directors, to the editor, assistant director, and colourist. Our writer’s rooms and editorial teams often include strong female voices, and we’ve found that this balance directly shapes the sensitivity and nuance of the stories we tell. 

Our films often centre on themes of equity, diversity, and inclusion—whether it’s disability, gender, caste, or socio-economic disparity. And that commitment begins at the research stage.

We make it a point to speak to individuals from within the communities we’re filming, not just as subjects, but as thought partners. For example, while working on our film about individuals with Down syndrome, we spent months engaging with families, caregivers, educators, and adults with Down syndrome themselves. These conversations deeply informed both our storytelling and our ethics. 

That said, when it comes to hiring individuals with disabilities as part of our crew or post-production teams, we’re still not where we want to be. Accessibility in the film industry, whether physical, technological, or attitudinal, is an area that needs far more attention, including from us. It’s a work in progress. But our intention is clear: to make both our stories and our processes reflect the kind of world we’re trying to build through our films. So, if you are a person with disability reading this article who would like to share our storytelling journey, please reach out to us.

With Sitaare Zameen Par hitting the theatres, there is a conversation going on about good and bad representation of disability on screen. What are, according to you, examples of good representation of disability on screen in India and the world, fictional or otherwise? 

Pavitra and Akshay: We believe that any film that authentically portrays people with disabilities, especially in real life, like in a documentary, helps push the needle forward. It creates space for visibility, for dignity, and for narratives that move beyond stereotypes. 

“Crip Camp” is a film that really stayed with us. To see people with diverse disabilities speak about their own challenges, organise, and come together with such clarity and agency to push for legislative change, that was powerful. It made us wonder: could something like that happen in India? The truth is, we have a long way to go. Accessibility here still tends to be viewed in narrow terms, ramps, and Braille signage. But true accessibility is about so much more. It’s about changing systems, attitudes, infrastructures, and expectations so that people with all kinds of disabilities can participate fully, freely, and without friction in society. We need to fundamentally reimagine what inclusion really looks like. 

We also really enjoyed “The Peanut Butter Falcon.” It was a joy to watch, and what made it truly special was that it featured Zack Gottsagen, a real actor with Down syndrome, in a leading role, not as a symbol or a sidekick, but as a fully realized character with his own dreams, choices, and quirks. There was a sense of warmth, humour, and respect that stayed long after the credits rolled. 

And “Life, Animated,” was an incredibly moving film. The way it explored the inner world of a young man with autism, using his love for Disney films as a bridge to communication and independence, was both deeply emotional and profoundly respectful. We’d love to see more storytellers and filmmakers begin to address what has long been unaddressed when it comes to people with disabilities. Things like the right to desire, to have a sex life, to express and celebrate one’s sexuality. We need to talk about the real career ambitions of people with disabilities that are often shut down not because of skill, but because of limited public perception. 

We need stories that celebrate who they are, not just in relation to their disability, but in relation to their unique personalities, talents, humour, contradictions, and everyday lives. 

Looking ahead, what structural changes would you like to see in the Indian documentary space to enable more self-representation and authorship by storytellers with disabilities themselves? 

Pavitra and Akshay: If we want to see real self-representation and authorship by storytellers with disabilities in the Indian documentary space, we need to go beyond performative inclusion and rethink the structure entirely. 

We often hear talk of “giving voice” to storytellers with disabilities, but that framing itself is flawed. People with disabilities already have voice. What’s missing is a system that’s quiet enough to listen. One that isn’t built on gatekeeping, but on shared authorship. One that doesn’t just open the door but questions who built the door in the first place, and for whom. 

Self-representation means more than just being allowed to participate, it means having the agency to shape the story. And for that, we need structural changes: accessible funding pipelines, mentorships that are designed with, and for creators with disabilities, inclusive training environments, and industry frameworks that are flexible to different ways of thinking, working, and expressing. 

At Curley Street, we’re actively questioning the norms. Who says there’s only one “right” way to write, to shoot, to edit? Why does the “industry standard” often exclude the very voices we need most? We believe that storytellers with disabilities have a way of seeing the world that’s powerful and necessary not just for the disability community, but for everyone. 

(Editor’s Note: You can reach out to the team at CurleyStreet at info@curleystreet.com.)