Dakxinkumar Bajrange (Chhara)
Dakxinkumar Bajrange (Chhara) is an award-winning filmmaker, playwright, and activist from the Chhara De-notified Tribes of Ahmedabad, India. A passionate advocate for the rights and visibility of India’s Nomadic and De-notified Tribes (DNTs), his creative work bridges art, social justice, and community empowerment.
He is a recipient of the Ford Foundation International Fellowship (2010–11) and earned his postgraduate degree in Theatre and Global Development from the University of Leeds, UK. His acclaimed book Budhan Bolta Hai (Budhan Speaks) received the Mahatma Gandhi Best Creative Writing on Human Rights Award (2010–11) from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).
Dakxin has also been awarded the Rajiv Gandhi Arts Fellowship (2004–05) and the Bhasha Fellowship (2002–03) for his research on the art forms of nomadic and de-notified communities in Gujarat.
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His films have been recognized nationally and internationally. Notable honors include:
2nd Best Documentary Film Award for Mhara Pichchar – New Delhi Film Festival, 2025
Kerala State Award for The Last Man – International Documentary Short Film Festival of Kerala, 2021
Best Director and Award for Excellence – 7th Art Independent International Film Festival, 2022 (Budhan Podcast)
Best Director and Best Documentary – Picasso Einstein Buddha International Film Festival, 2022 (The Last Man)
Donald E. Lacy Jr. Social Justice Award – Studio City International Film Festival, 2020 (The Last Man)
Award of Merit – 7th Arts International Film Festival, 2020 (The Last Man)
Best Director Award – 7th Arts International Film Festival, 2020 (COVID-19 Blame Game)
He has also been:
Nominated for the Social Impact Award (Theatre & Films) by IIM Ahmedabad, 2019
Nominated for the Fellowship for Freedom of Expression, INDEX, UK, 2018
Recognized among the “Heroes of Ahmedabad” by Ahmedabad Mirror, 2014
Invited by the United Nations (NY, 2007) to speak on India’s Nomadic and De-notified Tribes
Dakxin is the Artistic Director of Budhan Theatre, a pioneering community theatre group that amplifies DNT voices across the world. He is also the Founding Director of Nomad Movies Pvt. Ltd., which produces socially conscious films and trains youth from marginalized communities in filmmaking.
To date, he has written and directed 13 plays, supervised 48 productions, and performed over 1,000 shows across India. As a filmmaker, he has directed more than 130 fiction and non-fiction films and television series on social, developmental, and political themes.
His feature film Sameer (2017), starring Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub, Seema Biswas, and Anjali Patil, was released theatrically in India and streamed globally on Netflix (2017–2019). The film was screened at the New York Indian Film Festival, Charlotte Asian Film Festival, and Indian International Film Festival of Queensland, where he received the Best Director Award.
Dakxin has trained over 20 emerging filmmakers from Dalit, Adivasi, and DNT communities. He also served as Project Director for a 20-episode film series on COVID-19 challenges faced by marginalized groups. Recently, he led an AHRC-funded research project with the University of Leicester, titled Film Ecologies in India, which trained youth in filmmaking across diverse and remote regions including the Himalayas, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, and Jodhpur.
He is also the co-author and editor (with Prof. Henry Schwarz, Georgetown University) of the book Vimukta – Freedom Stories (Navayana Publications, 2021). His articles on theatre, film, and social change have appeared in numerous national and international journals and newspapers.
For more information about his work, media coverage, and filmography, please visit www.nomadmovies.in
