Raghav Khanna established himself as one of the leading documentary filmmakers in India over the years, with many notable works. During his stint with Netflix as the head of documentary productions, he oversaw the production of many notable works including the Academy Award-winning documentary The Elephant Whisperers, crime docu-series House of Secrets , The Hunt For Veerappan, and many more. The filmmaker is currently busy with the making of his next outing Tiffin Stories, which is a documentary food series.

In a recent Exclusive chat with OTT Play, Raghav Khanna opened up about becoming a part of prestigious projects like The Elephant Whisperes, his next project Tiffin Stories, and the growth of documentary genre in Indian entertainment space. Read the excerpts from the chat here...

It is a project that is very close to my heart. I was co-commissioning, working with Netflix at that point in time. We felt that - the passion with which director Kartiki Gonsalves was making this documentary, and the binding agents that Guneet Monga and Sikhya Entertainment were – this is going to be a special project. We all secretly wished for it getting the biggest award and honors. So, it was almost a dream come true that it won the Academy Award and all the big honours.

You closely worked with many crime docu-series including The Hunt for Veerappan, House Of Secrets, and others. How do you feel about the growth of this genre in the Indian OTT space?

This is the moment I have been personally working towards, from the last 15 years. I started making documentaries when the word was not mainstream. People felt if you are making documentaries, you are not getting a lot of work. It was believed that if you are becoming a documentary filmmaker, it is not by choice, but because of the lack of opportunities. Thanks to the streaming platforms, in the last 7 to 8 years, the way documentaries got redefined in the global space, India started making highly engaging and entertaining documentaries, executed to the highest cinematic finesse.

The audience embraced it. If the documentaries are well made, if they are equally engaging and entertaining as their fictional counterparts, there is no reason to say that they are they cannot enjoy the same amount of success. This is the golden era of documentaries. If you are a young documentary filmmaker, right now you can execute any concept at the highest possible, available level. You just need to work with the right people and take the project in the right direction.

Tiffin Stories originated with this belief that food is not just something that satiates your hunger, or something you consume for its taste. Like photographs, it has an element of nostalgia, it binds families together. It is that shared common emotion and memory, that lives long. When you say ‘Maa ke hath ka khana’, it is not just the taste. It is the memory of a lifetime. It is your entire childhood in a plate. And when I was working with this concept, I felt that this is a story that needs to be told.

Because, it is so personal and so emotional, and there are so many people there who can relate food with memories. So, every episode of Tiffin Stories has a distinct theme. How food can lead to a certain theme, and you have people who talk about their life journeys and how food played a great role in it. So, it is not just about food, or a celebration of it, but it has emotions associated with it. I’m deeply thankful to chef Asma Khan ji for believing in this concept and hosting this series, and all my guests. We are making something very special, and I can’t wait to bring it out to the world.

There is a sports documentary film that we are making. It is very international in its approach, and very Indian at its core. This is an attempt where we want to bridge the gap between documentaries and practical cinema. It has happened in the past also. If you see the Indian documentary features have won the highest awards and are being nominated at the highest platforms. So, what we are now doing is, we are making documentary features, that can be enjoyed by all audience.

I think we have had tremendous success, if you look at streaming shows in particular. They are some of the best shows, when you stream from across the world. Indian streaming particularly has set the benchmark so high, we no longer have to look to set the West to set the parameters. The benchmarks are right at our home. They are made by our friends and colleagues. And we get to match them and better them. We also stand at a grand opportunity where, not only do we make content for Indian audiences. Now we can make content from India that is globally successful, where we become reference points for content creators across the world.

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