Bangladeshi documentary ‘Pankauri’ selected for Delhi’s River Festival

Bangladeshi documentary ‘Pankauri’, directed by Jafar Muhammad, has been selected for the documentary programme ‘The River as an Archivist’ at the seventh River Festival, scheduled to take place at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts in New Delhi from September 24 to 26.

The 18-minute-17-second observational documentary centres on the Karatoya River in Panchagarh, Bangladesh, and Mujibur Rahman, who spent 55 years collecting stones from the river. Muhammad began making the film in 2019 and completed it in 2025. Mujibur Rahman died while the film was in post-production.

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‘Pankauri’ has also been screened at the 12th Kolkata People’s Film Festival, where the festival’s official programme lists it as an 18-minute documentary.

The documentary won Best Short Documentary at the third Chittagong International Documentary Film Festival in January 2026.

Director of the documentary, Muhammad said the film explores the Karatoya as a transboundary river shared by Bangladesh and India, focusing on the river and the memories and lives that have flowed alongside it.