SYNOPSIS

The documentary is called "INDIA ON THE MOVE" for good reason. “The elephant is thundering,” says Vineet Agarwal whose family owns India’s largest freight company – the one growing at 25 per cent a year.

And from his leather armchair, in the living room of his private jet, an Airbus A319 that would normally carry 130 passengers, billionaire Vijay Mallya leans forward, chuckles and declares that: “before, America and Europe held centre stage. I guess centre stage is going to move east.”

Such is the confidence that now abounds in an economy that boasts a middle-class of 300 million, and more young people than anywhere else on earth — 500 million under 25.

See the call center come of age, and Arjun and Sunita’s good life unfold. They are American-trained doctors, married with two kids, running two businesses and clearing email in the car on the way to work. In one business they do radiology over the Internet: a room full of Indian radiologists analyze cat-scans and x-rays of patients sitting in emergency rooms in America. They turn the results round in half an hour.

“This is almost space age medicine,” says Arjun, a Yale graduate.

But “India on the Move” also reveals that India still has a long way to go. It is all “space age” and “consumer age” in the cities, but medieval in the countryside, where farmers live in dire debt, and an alarming number commit suicide.

Corruption is improving, but remains endemic; public education is woeful; and crucially, despite all progress, there remains a desperate need for jobs. The Indian growth of recent times has largely been driven by the service sector and software, but the documentary makes clear that India will have to make widgets and not just digits, if it wants to ever provide enough jobs.

"INDIA ON THE MOVE" captures all this through the lives of people at a moment in history when this ancient civilization has decided to take on the future — and transform the world.

CHARACTERS

Anand Mahindra

Anand is Managing Director, Mahindra & Mahindra, a company just slightly older than India itself and famous for building tractors and assembling Willy Jeeps after the Second World War. He is 52 with a BA in film and photography and an MBA from Harvard. Mahindra is particularly known for his risky decision to build the first SUV in India, the Scorpio. It has been a big success — the muscle car for the Indian middle-class — and an emblem of a country transformed. He sees his country gaining a new confidence from the booming economy: “I think we didn't envision a grand future for ourselves.”

Madhukar Mandhavkar

A 30-year-old farmer who has a small but critical part in the drama that is unfolding in modern India. He lives in Bhamb Raja in Maharashtra State. A computer has been introduced to this ancient village, where oxen carts clatter through narrow paths. The satellite dish that connects the computer to the rest of the world sits atop Madhukar’s outhouse. For the first time the farmers of Bhamb Raja are able to access the price of cotton, soybeans and other crops, before they take them to market. Madhukar hopes the computer can ease the farmer’s burden and connect him to, if not the “good times” that are to be found in the cities, at least to slightly better times.

Sima Malik

Sima, 32, has a Bachelor of Commerce, an indomitable spirit, and a desperate need for a better paying job. She is a marketing manager for a courier company in Kolkata (Calcutta), and her plight reveals an uncomfortable truth about the Indian economy. India has seen explosive growth in the IT sector, but not in manufacturing. The boom so heralded in news reports around the world is a boom for relatively few people. Sima, however, has one thing that is in short supply in the desperately poor states of India: optimism. She is certain that with sheer hard work, she is going to make it.

Vijay Mallya

Vijay travels the world in his private jet. He has palatial homes in Goa, and California, and a castle in Scotland. He has shrewdly turned his father’s United Breweries into an empire with a wide wingspan that includes: spirits, fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, and an airline named after his famous beer — Kingfisher. He is the billionaire “ringmaster” of the good times economy and owns a TV channel called exactly that: “The Good Times”.

Arjun Kalyanpur and Sunita Maheshwari

A husband and wife doctor team, they have been lured back to Bangalore from the U.S. by the air of excitement and the chance to set up a lucrative business giving instant readings of x-ray charts sent to them from American hospitals. They love nothing better than spending Sunday with their kids at their luxuriously appointed private club.

BROADCAST CREDITS

Directed and Produced by
NEIL DOCHERTY
SARAH SPINKS

Written by
NEIL DOCHERTY

India Producer
BATUL MUKHTIARM

Narrator
MICHAEL MURPHY

Editor
MURRAY GREEN

Director of Photography
HANS VANDERZANDE

Field Sound Recording
MARY WONG

Original Music Composed by
KEN MYHR

Sound Design
RON SEARLES

Art Director / Graphic Design
STEPHEN DUTCHESHEN

Business Manager
WILMA ALEXANDER

Project Manager
ANNE EMIN

Series Producer
KELLY CRICHTON

Executive Director, CBC Documentary Programming
MARK STAROWICZ

Executives in Charge of Production
SUSAN DANDO (CBC)
CLAUDIA RUETE (ZDF)
LOWRI GWILYM (S4C)
ANN JULIENNE (FRANCE 5)

Character Voices
RAOUL BHANEJA
NATASHA CHANDAL
NAZNEEN CONTRACTOR
SABRINA JALEES
SURESH JOHN
VIJAY MEHTA
MALIKA MENDES
AMISH PATEL
ALI RIZVI
RONICA SAJNANI
SUGITH VARUGHESE

Casting Director
GAIL CARR CDC

Musicians
KIREN AHLUWALIA
GEORGE KOLLER
RAVI NAMPALLY
ERNIE TOLLAR

Production Manager
DAVID WILSON

Unit Manager
BEVERLEY HAFFNER

Associate Producer
GRIFFIN ONDAATJE

Visual Research
MICHELLE DEMEYERE

Post Production Supervisor
PAT GOODLAND

Associate Director
IAN CAMPBELL

Resource Coordinators
ANALISA AMOROSO
MEGAN BEECKMANS

Communications Manager
NANCY BOYLE

Associate Business Managers
DINA PINO
TAMMY RAYMOND

Assistant to Susan Dando
MARIA KNIGHT

Assistant to Mark Starowicz
NADINE SIMUNIC

Consultants
HABIB BEARY
DANIEL LAK

Additional Camera
COLIN ALLISON
NANDU

Additional Sound
NANDHKUMAR RAJESH

Maps
KIMBERLY MacDONALD

Production Coordination (India)
SHERNAZ ITALIA

Voice Recording
RON SEARLES
STEVE CUPANI

Sound Effects
ALAN GELDART

Foley Artist
FLOYD BURRELL

Foley Recordist
DON DICKSON

Colourist
JOANNE ROURKE

Online Editor
MURRAY GREEN

Archival Sources
Cobrapost
CNNImage Source
NDTV
Spyker Cars
STAR TV