MUMBAI, Nov. 21 -- On Monday, 46 independent filmmakers came together and shared a statement on social media. Carrying names like Payal Kapadia, Shaunak Sen, Honey Trehan, Kanu Behl among others, it stressed on the unfair treatment indie films in India are subjected to in the hands of exhibitors and distributors despite global acclaim. "Over the last decade, Indian independent cinema has carried the country's creative identity to the world.And yet, within India, these films continue to fight simply to be seen." Citing persistent problems such as "limited screenings" and "sudden show cancellations", the collective demanded fair access at both theatres and streaming platforms with possibilities of screening films at state-run cultural institutions. On Wednesday, Kamal Gianchandani, president of the Multiplex Association of India (MAI) responded, saying, "While showcasing decisions are taken independently by each exhibitor.these decisions are guided by audience demand and performance indicators that evolve week by week. He added that the intent is to accommodate diversity and that "screen or show allocation is a dynamic process." Ironically, this "dynamic" screen distribution has led to a rare show of collective resistance from indie filmmakers in India. Kanu Behl's Agra, his second feature film in a decade, released on November 14 to limited screens. As of now it has five shows across Mumbai, either at late night or afternoons. The numbers look more dismal when one considers that Agra, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2023 and played at the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival in the same year, has single slots at the city's multiplexes. Calling out this unfairness, Behl urged people to spread the word on social media. Filmmakers such as Sudhir Mishra and Anubhav Sinha rallied on X (formerly Twitter), as did actor Manoj Bajpayee. And then, came the statement. "On November 14, I was on a panel with a few filmmakers. We spoke about the issue and they suggested that I create a group on WhatsApp. I did and since then more and more filmmakers are getting added," Behl shared. "Once the news started spreading that we were attempting something like this, it grew organically." The attempt, a clear-worded resistance, feels like a tipping point. In India, independent cinema has long struggled to secure theatrical release. Documentaries continue to bear the bigger brunt but beyond drawing equivalence, lies a common problem. Filmmaker Alankrita Shrivastava, one of the signees, recollects facing something similar during the release of her first film, Turning 30 (2011). "We struggled to get proper distribution and shows." But she insists that things were more still more thoughtful. "Even mine was a limited release but it played at multiplexes and was way more accessible." The recent rigidity could be attributed to the seismic post-pandemic shift in some parts of Indian cinema, including Hindi films, where spectacle and scale have overtaken everything else. This disbalance is pushing independent cinema further to the periphery. Streaming platforms, once hailed as an alternate mode of distribution, have been less accommodating. "They have homogenised our worst tendencies of making bets on films. Earlier between blockbusters a smaller film would come and do extremely well, inaugurating distribution and exhibition tendencies for the next ten years," Sen, whose film All That Breathes is on JioHotstar, notes. However, with their refusal to share data on viewership, "everybody is paying obeisance at the altar of a few people who are deciding." The upshot of this is conventional programming where most star-studded vehicles make their streaming debuts after a brief theatrical run. The bigger issue, however, is the lack of clarity and accessibility. Filmmaker Karan Tejpal shares that after his film Stolen (2023) premiered at the Venice Film Festival, he found it challenging to get his foot in the door with streamers. He managed to show the film to Netflix and they refused. Things only changed when Nikkhil Advani, Kiran Rao, Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane joined as executive producers. "Vikram made a call and things moved like a bullet." Stolen dropped on Amazon Prime this year. Another indie, Aranya Sahay's Humans in the Loop dropped on Netflix last month. Rao is an EP on that as well. "Everything in India happens top-down" Tejpal laments. If not in the same words but Sidharth Meer, producer of indie films, echoes this. "When a force, who has better relationships with exhibitors, joins an indie film it helps." Case in point would be superstar Rana Daggubati's production house Spirit Media that has distributed Kapadia's All We Imagine As Light (2024) and Rohan Kanawade's Sundance-winning, Sabar Bonda (2025). Netflix refused to comment on this piece and while a set of questions were sent to Prime, the answers hadn't come at the time of writing this. "Cinemas have consistently championed independent films whenever there is demonstrable audience interest. We remain committed to working together with our filmmakers to find practical solutions," Gianchandani shared. While the results of that are yet to be seen, for now the signees on the statement are in the process of forming a body that will represent their rights in a structured way. "We hope to create a body that can speak to the bigger players - distributors, exhibitors, producers, the government and Producers Guild of India - and initiate a conversation," Behl shares....