Speakers
86 minutes | English with subtitles | 2026
One million applicants. Seven seats. Then what?
Seven young people from across India fight their way into IIT, only to find that getting in was the easier part. The filmmaker, an IIT alumnus himself, spent seven years with them, from their first semester to the third year of their careers.
Decades after graduating, Gautam Sonti recognised in these students the same pressure he had once felt: a system that measures everything and nurtures very little. TechnoCats is his attempt at a conversation across generations.
The screening will be followed by a discussion between Gautam Sonti, Tara Rao and Aunohita Mojumdar, before opening to audience questions.
Watch the trailer here.
In collaboration with:
Speakers
Gautam Sonti
As an independent documentary filmmaker, Gautam Sonti has turned his camera on contemporary systems that shape us — from primary and secondary schools, to workplaces of global software companies, to cities that are forever being rebuilt, to the social and cultural structures that influence what we eat. An IIT graduate who never quite ran the expected race, Gautam comes full circle, back to the place where his questions began.
Tara Rao
Tara Rao has worked on campaigns, measured impact and built teams, among others, for Amnesty, Greenpeace and WWF. She led and mentored Good Pitch Karnataka – for social projects with media at the heart of change-making. Heading up the Human Rights Education Programme for Amnesty International India, she designed new approaches to integrating an awareness of human rights among school children. Her interests in today’s complex challenges (higher education, climate action, structural racism, active citizenry) are driven by building opinion and seeking consensus within communities and society as a whole, towards creating a collective sense of purpose and action.
Aunohita Mojumdar
Aunohita Mojumdar is an Indian journalist who has been a reporter and editor for over 30 years. She has lived and worked in Afghanistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and India. She has published in numerous regional and international media outlets including The Guardian, Financial Times, BBC, Asia Times, Al Jazeera, Eurasianet, Khaleej Times, Panos, the Hindu, Hindustan Times, Women’s enews, Times of India, Hard News and Civil Society. She was the Editor of the South Asian magazine Himal Southasian. She is currently based in Bangalore.
You might also like
Delimitation and Its (Multiple) Discontents
How the 2027 Census Could Redraw India’s Political Fault Lines
RSVP here
