00:00 Hi, I'm Bharat Bala. I'm a filmmaker. I've been on a journey of discovering stories of
00:14 India from almost every nook and corner. We're creating a unique digital proposition of culture,
00:27 content and technology as an approach to capture some amazing, unique, untold stories from every
00:35 remote corner of India, make them into short films. So what is the uniqueness and the strength
00:42 of this for tourism is that each of these stories tell us something very culturally rooted and it
00:50 comes from the people. They are human stories and this is not something that you package in tourism
00:56 like every state, every country, destination have a now a kind of a standard formula. But what we
01:04 lose out in that formula is a sense of identity that pulls you to a destination.
01:09 And that will come through when we tell short stories of people, places, art, performing art,
01:18 poetry of the landscape, which then suddenly speaks the language of that space, speaks the
01:26 language of the people. And that attracts you to go and discover, explore and immerse yourself
01:33 into a certain tradition, a certain art, certain idiom that you went out to look for. So this,
01:41 I would say should be a new language or a new asset in the tourism industry so that everybody
01:49 can build from ground, from the strength from the ground, because what is the strength of each
01:55 destination is your own people, is your own culture, is your own art and the landscape that
02:02 because landscape and art reflect each other. Landscape and people's stories reflect each other.
02:09 If you put them together in an interesting way, compelling way, which you can then smell
02:16 the landscape, you can hear the sound, you can feel the soil of that space, that will excite
02:25 travelers, that will help you take home stories, emotions, which then become a part of your
02:33 experience, part of you own that experience. That is very critical. And virtual Bharat is a space
02:40 where at the moment we are building about 1000 stories of India about people. You know, we talk
02:49 about great traditions, great art, great performing art. So we are curating those stories. And the
02:56 most important aspect is the stories have to be timeless. You can listen to it today. You can
03:03 sit back and view it five years from now. And then you remember the visit, the space that you
03:11 have been to link with that story, which brings a much deeper emotional connect to your experiences.
03:19 So how difficult it is to find these stories for you?
03:22 See, fortunately for me, because of my travel across the country over the last 20 years,
03:30 I've been constantly collecting these stories. And now, thanks to the democratization of the
03:37 internet and the digital platform, you are able to put out the story for everybody to look at it.
03:43 And all these stories have to be in its original language, so that you can feel the sound,
03:48 you can feel the emotion of the people. And we have curated about 300 stories so far.
03:57 And 1000 is just a number. India has 1000s of stories. But we have begun a small journey,
04:05 we are proud about the journey. And what we do is we don't interfere in the story,
04:11 in the sense the story unfolds itself and tells the audience directly. So which is like,
04:17 for example, there's a story in Behni Sahib in Punjab, where young girls, you know, who are,
04:29 you know, at the age of now going to having contemporary lifestyle, are following certain
04:36 traditions in the village. They learn classical music. If you walk into the village in the
04:42 evenings, the entire Behni Sahib is resonating with melody of classical music. But these girls
04:51 are learning classical music, and also are having fun in their Facebook and Instagram,
04:58 and they drive their scooters, play their games and go to malls, etc. But somewhere the preservation
05:04 of art and culture is there. And once you see that story, you will feel like I want to go to
05:10 Behni Sahib. I want to hear the sound of this place. And that is something beautiful.
05:14 Thank you so much.
05:16 Thank you.
05:17 Transcribed by https://otter.ai
05:19 Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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