Dollar City

About the film

Tirupur aka Dollar City, well known for its thousands of export oriented garment hosiery units and millions of migrant workers, symbolizes a development model where the state machinery, exporters, small and big entrepreneurs, commission agents, trade unionists and workers converge to prioritize export and to earn dollars by ignoring, marginalizing and eventually breaking the laws that protect the environment and workers’ rights. The film provides an inside view of a successful economic system where there is connivance and consensus between the masters, mediators and the workers, where the ambitions and loyalties collapse, where the rights become a privilege, where duty becomes an opportunity and where one’s desperation is another’s prospect. The fact that there has not been a workers strike in Tirupur in the past 20 years, as proudly expressed by an exporter in the film, can be seen as a classic example of the Gramscian idea of manufacture of consent.

Director Biography

Amudhan founded and is part of Marupakkam (The Other Side), a media activist group that makes films and organizes regular film screenings, film festivals, film workshops and interactions in South India. He founded Madurai International Documentary and Short Film Festival in 1998 and also founded Chennai International Documentary and Short Film Festival in 2013. He has made 19 documentaries, which include a trilogy each on Caste, Nuclear Radiation and Development. He has been associating with film/media schools, cultural groups, social organizations and educational institutions as a curator and/or guest faculty and/or resource person.