Khoriya
Vishwendra Singh
India. 2026. 81 min

Two Nepali half-brothers run a poultry farm on the outskirts of a city. The older brother wants to expand the farm, while the younger dreams of becoming a soldier and settling down with his girlfriend. When their livelihood is threatened by an outbreak of the avian flu, the older brother turns to the illegal trade of steroids by targeting military recruits, and drags his younger brother into the business. His girlfriend, who works in the beauty industry, decides to leave for Dubai in search of bigger opportunities. Set against the labor spaces of those pushed to the margins of society, such as poultry farms, military prep schools, construction sites, and shopping malls, the film delves into the social structures built upon a ruthless competition for survival. This debut feature by Vishwendra Singh was discovered by Film Bazaar’s WIP Lab, a major platform for independent films in South Asia. The title Khoriya, a term for traditional slash-and-burn farming system in Nepal, overlaps with characters who, unable to find their foothold anywhere, are pushed from one site of labor to another, and their displacement becomes someone else’s source of profit.

VISHWENDRA SINGH

Vishwendra Singh is an Indian filmmaker based in the national capital, Delhi. Working extensively at Future East Film between 2016-2019, assisting filmmaker Ashim Ahluwalia, he has been part of various feature films and an episodic series: the gangster epic Daddy [2017], the horror anthology Field Guide To Evil [2018] by Alamo Drafthouse (US) and Netflix’s (India) OTT series CLA$$ [2023]. His first short film, Hauah, in his native Braj language, was awarded and showcased at the New York Indian Film Festival (US), the Dharamshala International Film Festival (India), the Jagran Film Festival (India), Nottingham Arts Mela (UK). Along with long-format fiction projects, Vishwendra also works in advertising, directing and producing brand commercials.

DIRECTOR´S NOTE

Khoriya was not born as fiction, but as a documentary of the half-buried hopes and dreams of migrant labourers nestled on the peripheries of the city and society. Underneath the rubble of metropolitan excess and waste, in an almost sewer-like ecosystem, resilient men and women wearing different faces occupy these shadows and rename them home. In the summer of 2019, I immersed myself in documenting these transient lives that seemingly exist only as fodder for the city’s vain needs.
There is an unspoken weight, a quiver in their voice that reveals long-forgotten memories and distant fortunes — a pattern I noticed in almost everyone I spoke to. The seething angst of their eroded identities and deferred dreams eventually dissolved into a singular experience across various migrant communities — of striving for recognition, of the scorn of being overlooked. A sentiment so essential, so universal, not unlike anything expressed in the past, these stories revealed to me a very specific vector of their manifestation, one that, like their efforts, seldom sees the light of day. What emerged was a narrative concerning the uncertain lives of Nepali migrant workers, an essential yet unseen force within India’s urban fabric.

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niharika@futureeast.com