Meghnath

Meghnath was born on 29 June 1953 in Bombay of Bombay State (now Mumbai of Maharashtra). He did his schooling in Bombay and started social work in 1971 in the refugee camps of the Bangladesh Liberation War. He started rural development work in the National Service Scheme (NSS) under the guidance of Fr. Gerard Beckers and worked as a volunteer for the Students Health Home, a co-operative health movement of the students with 3 lakh members. He was elected the Joint Secretary of Health Home for the years 1975 to 1977. Meghnath completed his graduation from St. Xavier's College, Kolkata, in 1977 and was the organizer of the highest voluntary blood donor in 1977 and 1978. He did his diploma in social work at the Indian Social Institute, Bangalore, in 1980 and came to Palamu district in 1981 to work on the issue of bonded labor in Jharkhand and eventually participated in the people's struggle to save the land, water, and forest. He was part of the Jharkhand Movement and was the founder member of the Jharkhand Coordination Committee (JCC) along with B. P. Keshri, Sanjay Basu Mallick, N. E. Horo, Bishop Nirmal Minj, and others. He did a short course on filmmaking at the Notre Dame Communication Centre, Patna, in 1988 and at CENDIT, New Delhi, in 1989. In 1990, he did a Film Appreciation Course from FTII, Pune, and the National Film Archive of India and also became a part of the National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) and was part of Narmada Bachao Andolan along with Medha Patkar and participated in fasting for 22 days on the banks of Narmada. He also worked with reputed documentary filmmakers Tapan Bose and Suhasini Mulay in 1989-91, and he started discussion and debate on the pro-people development models in predominately Adivasi areas and was the founder member of Pani Chetna Manch along with members of the People's Science Institute. He worked on an alternative irrigation model and was part of making 125 small check dams (Ahar) and pines in Palamu district in 1993-95 under Sukha Mukti Abhiyan.

In 1993, he formed the group AKHRA to work in the field of culture and communication along with others. He was the guest faculty of the Mass Communication and Journalism department in St. Xavier's College, Ranchi. In the last 40 years of social and cultural work, he has had the opportunity to work and learn from many great people, and to name a few, they are Fr. Gerard Beckers, Debabrata Roy, Mother Teresa, Pannalal Das Gupta, Bishop George Sopien, B. P. Keshri, Tapan Bose, Suhasini Mulay, Satish Bahadur, P. K. Nair, Baba Amte, Sunderlal Bahuguna, Medha Patkar, and Ram Dayal Munda. He considers filmmaking as the extension of his social and cultural work. Along with Biju Toppo, he has worked in more than 15 films that have received national and international recognition.