Beyond the Courts: Justice in Action
We trace our storytelling process for our latest film for Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies, and what it revealed about systems, quiet truths, and the small acts that shift both.
Every once in a while, a project comes along that quietly rearranges your understanding of the world.
This one did.
When the lovely folks at Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies reached out to us, their ask was simple - the justice space needs its own storytelling. We came into it thinking we’d be making a film about Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and their interventions within the legal system.
What unfolded was much more layered.
It became a film about dignity, about listening deeply, about reimagining what justice really means when seen from the ground up.
What does it mean to create something where law isn’t the hero, but the people are?
This question loomed over our early brainstorms.
The justice system in India isn’t unfamiliar terrain. Its narrative often lies dangerously juxtaposed with what the public perceives it to be, and the stories that deservedly need to be platformed. Overburdened courts, overcrowded prisons, legal aid out of reach for those who need it most.
But what was new for us was the sheer variety of civil society actors working quietly to bridge the gap: lawyers, activists, researchers, community leaders, even former inmates.
One of our first calls was with Swapnil Shukla, who leads Zenith Society.
As he described how a survivor of gun violence chose not punishment but compensation and recovery, we had to pause.
This wasn’t your typical legal victory story. This was about redefining justice itself. Swapnil’s narration of Ram Ratan’s story on that call is exactly how our film opens.
Stories, in fact, do speak for themselves.
Conversations that felt like masterclasses
The honour was ours. Over the course of this project, we had the rare chance to sit with people who’ve not just worked in the justice sector but shaped it, challenged it, and in many ways, carried it forward.
These weren’t just conversations. They felt like masterclasses.
Maja Daruwala from IJR, who has spent a lifetime making us care about justice, reminded us that there’s room for humour, even when the work is heavy. Every perspective she offered came with a quip that lifted the room, a blend of wisdom and wit you don’t forget.
Sachin Malhan from Agami reframed the problem altogether with a quote from the renowned economist Ajay Shah.
While most of us are looking for design fixes like policy reform and institutional shifts, the quote reminded us that India is a land of discovery. Not design.
His lens was clear. Real change comes when we recognize and amplify the work of local actors, not override it.
In conversation with Mohit Raj of Project Second Chance, we saw what inside-out reform looks like. He shared the story of Deepak (name changed), a young man from the Sansi community, wrongfully incarcerated for three years. No lawyer would take his case.
Today, Deepak is building a tech platform to connect marginalised families with special pro bono lawyers who will.
What began as injustice became a solution, designed by someone who has lived the problem.
Professor Vijay Raghavan (Prayas) brought us back to the quiet, re-assuring, but radical power of presence.
When social workers enter a prison, simply by being there, they change the system. It’s humanising. Their approach to the incarcerated is unlike anyone else’s. And that presence matters more than we realise.
Roshni Shanker from MAP made us sit upright with something we hadn’t considered. As filmmakers, we knew of ASHA workers from our previous projects.
On that call, we realised what ASHA workers are to public health, is what paralegal volunteers are to the legal system. Folks who are often doing the heavy lifting in communities, with far fewer resources than we imagine.
Anisha Gopi from Nyaaya offered us a much needed mirror to the sector. Collaboration, she said, is critical but difficult. Especially when everyone is fighting for the same pool of funding.
But what if we weren’t reinventing the wheel each time? What if we simply joined forces, filled in gaps and closed loops? Moving from silos to collaborations, was a hope we wanted to lean into.
Each of these stories refused the black-and-white binaries we often see around crime, punishment and law.
They asked for something more. Something more human.
Beyond the Courts: Justice in Action
So a decision was made. This wouldn’t be a film that explains the justice system. This would be a film that reorients what we think about it.
One that expands the idea of justice beyond courts and legal codes.
We decided that the narrator would not lead, but follow. Much of the film's weight is carried by the voices of people in space.
Our job was to weave their insights into a structure that could move, inform and stay honest.
We built it piece by piece. Quote banks. Stat logs. Script rounds. Every sentence written as the narrator's voice had to earn its place.
One stretch I remember clearly was when we were stuck on how to introduce the prison segment. We had the data: 130% occupancy, 60% undertrials, long delays.
The question wasn’t “what’s broken?” It was: who’s stepping in and how?
That unlocked a new lens for us.
“You can’t solve a problem you’re too afraid to enter,” Maja’s voice played back to us in our initial drafts.
The CSOs weren’t filling in for the state. They were showing up where the system couldn’t or wouldn’t. We carried that framing into every segment of the film.
So what does the film hope to do?
A reframing. To reframe justice as a space that’s alive, messy, participatory and full of potential. I remember being behind the camera as Rohini Nilekani, Chairperson of Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies, summed up the reframing as simple, humane issues.
It was a nudge to Indian philanthropy to see justice not just as a courtroom issue, but as a space where civil society, community action and policy must converge.
The film, for me, is not so much about a sense of closure but a deeper belief that storytelling, when done right, can shift how a sector sees itself.
Not as fractured efforts in silos but as a network of possibility, where each act of showing up, of discovering not designing, of challenging a norm brings justice a little closer to those who need it.
It is fitting that we end this film, on a note that justice isn’t a fixed destination, it’s an evolving system.
If you're reading this as a creative, a funder, or someone in the justice ecosystem, this is our open invitation.
In a sector with so many voices and so many stories to tell, even today, with the film that’s gone out, I strongly believe that there is so much left to say.
Let us keep telling these stories. Let us keep stepping into the spaces that seem too slow, too stuck, too complex. Because sometimes, what changes the system isn’t one loud solution.
It is a series of quiet ripples. And this film, we hope, is one of them.