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Sridhar Rangayan
(April 2, 1962 - living) India

Sridhar Rangayan

Film Director, Screenwriter, Film Producer

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Sridhar Rangayan (also spelt Sridhar Rangaihn or Sridhar Rangayyan) was born in Mandya, Karnataka.

He is a graduate of NITK Surathkal and has a Post-graduate in Design from Industrial Design Centre, IIT Bombay, specializing in Visual Communication. Sridhar Rangayan worked with the National Institute for the Hearing Handicapped as Mass Media Officer and then for a while as a textile designer for an export firm, designing tapestries and carpets.

He is a filmmaker who has made films with special focus on queer subjects. His queer films The Pink Mirror and Yours Emotionally have been considered groundbreaking because of their realistic and sympathetic portrayal of the largely closeted Indian gay community. His film The Pink Mirror still remains banned in India by the Indian Censor Board because of its homosexual content.

As a gay activist, he has been one of the front-rank leaders in the LGBT movement in India and has contributed immensely towards the growth of awareness about sexual minorities in India. He also designed and edited India's first gay magazine Bombay Dost between 1999 - 2003.

In 2001 he founded his production company Solaris Pictures along with his partner Saagar Gupta, a writer and art director. The company is perhaps the only production company in India to specialize in production of gay themed films.

Rangayan's film Yours Emotionally is a co-production with an UK production company Wise Thoughts portrayed the angst of a gay British Asian falling in love with a bisexual Indian man in a small town. The film is considered to be a bold exploration of the Indian gay milieu with its stark and naked portrayal of homoerotic desires. Termed as an 'intoxicating queer journey through India', the film also raises questions about racism and identity. The film has screened at several international film festivals including Tasveer - Seattle South Asian Film Festival and Prague Bollywood Film Festival.

His recent film 68 Pages about stigma and discrimination faced by HIV+ people has been funded by DFID, UK and co-produced by his company Solaris Pictures along with The Humsafar Trust. This film which premiered at the International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) in December 2007 is about a HIV/AIDS counselor and how she instills hope and a will to live, among 5 HIV positive people from marginalized communities. A transsexual bar dancer, a gay couple, a sex worker and a drug user form the five narratives in this film. HIVOS has granted a fund to support screening of the film throughout India as part of its advocacy initiative. The National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) has made the film mandatory for all counselor training programmes throughout India as part of their NACP III program.

He was named to the jury for the Teddy Award for LGBT films at the 2010 Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale). Apart from filmmaking, Rangayan is also actively involved with human rights issues and the disability sector. He has made short film on cancer intervention and rehabilitation as well as several films on hearing impairment.

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Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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