The murals that we see on the public walls of the city are done by tribal artists. The murals are classified into two basic types. One is the Khovar, and the other is the Sohrai. In simple terms, Khovar is the one that is black and white, whereas Sohrai has all the colours. Both the Khovar and the Sohrai show different forms of birds and animals. The most admirable feature of these art styles is that they are not repetitive. One won’t find the same painting again because the artists don't paint it again. And, also, they don’t copy their pictures, so they are used to drawing pictures that are unique in their content and composition.

Khovar is an art form that has been practised for years by the tribal people of Jharkhand. It is not an art for men. It is only practised by the women in the villages. They paint their mud houses this way on the occasion of marriages. The word Khovar means the bridal cave. The art derived its name Khovar when a bridal couple was sent to spend their nuptial night in the forest khovar. They observed the paintings of the cave symbols and drew the same in the interiors. From then on, the tradition of painting the houses during marriages has continued among the tribal women. It has been practised in the spirit of sacred art for years.

Sohrai is an evolved form of Khovar. The women of the Kurmi tribe are skilled and known for these paintings. During the months of October and November, the women begin painting their wall houses in the name of Ghar Rangna. Their prime preparation for the festival of Diwali includes painting the houses with Sohrai paintings.

This project is all about my learning from a place in West Bengal called Santiniketan. The aim of this project is to become familiar with the basics of sculpting and understand the nature of different materials used for sculpting. I started by visiting the college, Kala Bhavan, for the first few days. Kala Bhavan happens to be among the country’s best art colleges and was established by Rabindranath Tagore way back in 1919. The degree show of the students was being held at that time, and I was fortunate enough to interact with the students and be able to learn from the enthusiastic people in my age group. My purpose of visit was to understand art in depth from the professor in Kala Bhavan and come up with some experiments of my own as a reflection of my learning.

Being a fan of Sherlock Holmes, I was very keen to make an animation film that revolves around crime and investigation. I had watched other crime fiction movies and knew it was a challenge to create one, especially if it was going to be a short animated film. I was very hazy about the idea and the story of the film at the earlier stages of my story construction. I wanted the crime in the story to be no less than a murder. I wanted my film to have an intense story, and a crime such as murder was what I wanted my characters to get involved in.

Crime stories are usually of two types, one being the Who-done it and the other, How-to-catch-them. Who-done-it stories have a crime that has probably occurred during or before the story, and the objective of the protagonist becomes to find the culprit among the suspects. The entire story shows elements of investigation, interrogation, and other activities of the sleuth. His acumen and his methods of deduction become the source of entertainment for the audience. But, in these kinds of story types, the main issue becomes the demand of the script. It would require some time to develop the characters in the movie and then reveal the true identity of one or more characters in the film. And such construction doesn’t suffice for the demands of a short animated film. A five- to ten-minute movie with such stories often becomes predictable.

I wanted the movie to have a protagonist who solves crime cases like jigsaw puzzles and an antagonist who is always a step ahead of the protagonist. The more strength one gives to the antagonist, the more the protagonist struggles, and subsequently, his reinforcement and his victory become things of interest to watch.

I looked at the other half of the crime fiction stories, which come under the ‘How to Catch Them category. Here, the protagonist and the audience are pretty much aware of the crime that is about to happen, but the challenge is to stop the crime from happening. The details are gradually revealed to the audience as the detective goes deep into his investigation and finds out what’s about to happen. These stories very well suit the structure of a short film.