Mumbai Fire Brigade - Riot Enactment

Duration: 00:16:50; Aspect Ratio: 1.333:1; Hue: 7.030; Saturation: 0.087; Lightness: 0.484; Volume: 0.329; Cuts per Minute: 9.260; Words per Minute: 42.440

The video is an enactment of a riot situation- as part of the training programme for a new search and rescue team that would be equipped to deal with street violence. One of the firemen plays a news reporter reporting live from the scene. There is a mock interview of a member of the search and rescue team. The trainee team members administer first aid to the injured in the background. The drama is enacted like a mad game between a team playing rioters, a team playing policemen, the search and rescue team of the fire department, a doctor and the press.
As the drama of violence and aggression proceeds, you sense the playacting turning into a competition between teams as the actors in their roles turn unpredictable and total pandemonium takes over.

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
M1: Help, help. Quick. Some one has hit him. (the man keeps repeating the cry for help as the rescue worker help the man acting to be injured)
Reporter: Sagar Naik reporting live, from the scene of this communal violence, which has raised its ugly head again. Let's speak to some people at the scene.
M1: They have hit him with a knife, his intestines have come out.
Rescue Worker 1 (RW1): (to the reporter) Please go away.
Reporter: Please sir.
The parking stilts of a fire station, in the background fire trucks are parked.
The fire department search and rescue blue and orange uniforms mark the members undergoing training, the rioters are dressed in bandanas, t-shirts and with sticks and plastic bottles in their hands, the victims lie prone through the entire drama, shirts torn open and mock blood.
The rioters at first attack the group banging bottles and sticks,
There are two "victims" lying on the floor, a medic, and the search and rescue team administering first aid through the loud screaming. The act of impersonation slowly builds up from being self consciously ridiculous to an adrenaline driven spectacle of violence.
carnage
confusion
drama
fire lorry
fire station
fire trucks
first aid
group
lynch
mayhem
medic
mob
mumbai fire brigade
pandemonium
prone
riot
rioters
search & rescue
victim
weapons
Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
M1: Help, please someone help him.
Reporter: What is happening here, please tell our audience?
Rescue worker 2 (RW2): I am a fire man, there is a riot broken out here. 3-4 people have been seriously injured. We have called for EMS and ambulance it will be here in some time.
Reporter: What all arrangements do you have for this riot?
RW2: We have all the arrangement.
Reporter: Which team are you from?
RW2: I am from team D, number 4.
Reporter: Where are you from?
RW2: I am from Mumbai fire brigade.
Reporter: And this uniform?
RW2: It is of Mumbai fire brigade.
The press guy calls a paramedic to the camera, and interviews him while the loud screaming and loud banging sounds almost drowns out most of the interview. He returns to the group. The act is as much to practice handling violence and destruction as to copy the 'reality TV' Since nothing happens unless they happen on TV, the Fire Brigade crew enjoys their short length stint in front of the camera. It is not a mere training exercise it is also an exercise in representation.
acting
banging
impersonation
interview
paramedic
press guy
reality show
representation
scare tactics
screaming
television

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
In all this the rioters seem to be the ones who have the most power in this game as they keep doing completely unpredictable things, making mischief, attacking each other, confessing murder in the front of the camera, and refusing to be intimidated. While all the rest have to play good law abiding and dutiful roles.
A rioter refuses to be moved by a policemen, kicks a chair away. They laugh as the policeman chases the rioter, his friend and in the opposite team almost.
A rioter runs off with a stretcher. Like the Bollywood flicks here too the baddies are far more imaginative and attractive than the peace keepers.
M1: Help someone, please help.
Police: Move, move. Leave this place right now.
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bedlam
bollywood
confession
flicks
games
imagination
impersonation
intimidation
kick
laugh
law-abiding
mayhem
policeman
power
rioter
role playing
stretcher
unpredictable

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
Reporter: As you can see, the scene is a total chaos…I wonder how the new search and rescue team is going to manage. There seem to be two causalities, very severely injured. Time is running out. And the trouble makers do not seem to be subsiding. The police are having a tough time as well.
M1: Someone help. Someone has hit him. Please save him.
Reporter: As you can see we are in the middle of communal riots back again.
The press boy makes a small performance in front of the camera-playing concerned TV reporter.
Camera returns to the prone man with a guy in black t-shirt screaming for help. The rioters start attacking each other.
One of them starts pushing a Search and Rescue team member to help his friend.
Some of the members look slightly shy at having to perform. Some seem to love playing like boys, wrestling and running around.
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blocking
camera
enactment
lynch
make-believe
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performance
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prone
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screaming
search and rescue
shouting
wrestling

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
Rescue Worker 2 (RW2): There are riots going on.
Reporter: How did it begin?
RW2: It is a fight between two groups.
Rioter 1: My friend has been injured.
RW2: Take it easy
Rioter 1: What do you mean, he is injured.
Reporter: It is some rare footage of communal violence.
Rioter 1: No you have to come, and treat my friend. Come now.
RW2: There are goons there, there is lot of violence happening there, be patient.
Rioter 1: I have been hit on the head.
RW2: I gave you the medical kit, go get it from there.
Rioter 1: Where is it, you come with me.
Rioter 1: You know I have committed the murder.
Police: (to the RW giving interview) You treat him first. You are giving an interview?
Rioter comes to pull the paramedic away from the camera as he was about to give an interview and happily confesses to murder to the camera. By now the fire brigade men are enjoying their roles of writing pot boiler scripts.
camera
interview
murder
obstruct
offense
paramedic
rioter

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
It is obvious that in contemporary life, the television anchors are the stars. The role playing of the good cop, the bad villain is as much aspired as that of playing the television anchors. The television news being the biggest thrillers, with all their 'from the trench' and 'the realest of the real facts' claims, often overshadow all other popular culture products in terms of and histrionics of the heroics. Even the videographer attempts to frame the scene within the convention of gangster films with fore grounded pillars.
Reporter: This is Prannoy Roy with a difference. Prannoy Roy usually brings you election analysis. I am bringing you analysis, but of a different kind. Counting of a different kind, not of elections but of dead bodies. As you can see out there.
M1: Please help.
Reporter: On world's wildest police videos, we bring you yet another episode of India's communal violence.
Rioter 2: Who has killed my brother?
M1: Help, please someone help.
Rioter 1: Is he your brother?
Rioter 2: Don't you dare hit my brother…please help my brother.
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fact
fiction
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gangster
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histrionics
impersonation
news
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pillars
press
real
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riot
speech
stardom
television
thrillers
videography

Byculla, Mumbai Fire Brigade Head Quarters
Reporter: Please tell us what is going on around here.
Rioter 1: What is happening here?
Reporter: News.
Rioter 1: Oh news!! I have killed him.
Reporter: Oh you killed him. Why did you kill him?
Rioter 1: He had killed my brother.
Reporter: Since how long is this happening?
Rioter 1: (to the RW) Since how long? Go and treat my brother.
Rescue Worker 1 (RW1): Lots of people are on the verge of dying.
Reporter: Who is responsible for all this?
RW1: It is because of communal riots.
Reporter: Okay, okay. And this is a very sensitive area.
RW1: We want a very big force, because we do not have the power to support them.
Reporter: Okay. Where are you from?
RW1: We are from search and rescue team from India.
Reporter: The riots still seem to be happening around, so how do you plan to handle the situation?
RW1: It has gone beyond our control, no one seem to be listening to us.
Reporter: I believe even some of your material has been stolen.
RW1: Yes.
Reporter: So how do you plan to…?
RW1: We have already asked for EMS, and we also require more force.
Reporter: We want to know what is going on.
Rescue Worker 3(RW3): Riots are going on. Inaudible
Reporter: Why is it happening?
RW3: inaudible.
Reporter: And you are from where?
RW3: I am from Mumbai fire brigade.
Reporter: Have you handled such a situation before?
RW3: Yes.
Reporter: I believe some of your material has been stolen.
RW3: inaudible.
M1: Help, help. Doctor please help him.
As general screaming and madness continues, the rioters start attacking each other again, In the foreground metal chairs is lying flung around.
Another happy confession from the man playing the rioter who seems to be enjoying his role as the uncontrollable player, who makes all unpredictable things happen.
In the end a bell rings, people are throwing chairs around, the rioter pushes and wrestles with a paramedic, search and rescue team members are bandaging the two victim's heads through constant screaming. Could it be an amatuer shooting for a local theatre groups or a tacky film?
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attacking
confession
exercise
flung
game
improvisation
intense
madness
make-believe
mayhem
mob
play-acting
role playing
screaming
shooting
story
sweat
tale

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