Introduction

This is a series of reflections by practitioners on their process of joining and being in the Cybermohalla labs, which were shared with over 200 people in a public gathering on the occasion of the launch of the Book Box (Baraat Ghar, Near Kali Building, Dakshinpuri, Delhi, 8th October, 2003).

The Cybermohalla (Cyber Neighbourhood) Project is a community of young practitioners who share each other’s thoughts, ideas, and creative energies in media labs located in working-class areas of Delhi. The young people who come to these media labs are between the ages of 15 to 23. At the labs, they work with media forms (photography, animation, sound recordings, online discussion lists, and text) to create cross-media works, texts, collages, posters, and wall magazines. Their writings and images can be seen as a rich database of narrative, comment, observation, imaginative play, and reflection on the contested circumstances of life in the sprawling urban metropolis of Delhi.

The project has been developed collaboratively by Sarai, a programme of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies and Ankur – Society for Alternatives in Education. The Cybermohalla Project addresses the interface between information technology and creativity in the lives of young people who live in a highly unequal society.

Production

Texts, Photographs, Recordings, Drawings & Animation: Media Lab @ Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Colony (Azra Tabassum, Babli Rai, Bobby Khan, Shahana Qureshi, Shamsher Ali, Sultana, Suraj Rai, Manoj Kumar, Masooma Ansari, Mehrunnisa, Naseem Bano, Neelofar, Rabiya, and Yashoda); Media Lab @ Dakshinpuri (Dhirender Pratap Singh, Kiran Verma, Kulvinder Kor, Lakhmi Chand Kohli, Love Anand, Nisha Kaushal, Polina, Raju Singh Malyal, Rakesh Kumar, and Sangeeta Kumari).

Editorial: Monica Narula and Shveta Sarda.

Translation: Shveta Sarda.

Design: Mrityunjay Chatterjee and Renu Iyer.

Design Co-ordination: Monica Narula.

Production Co-Ordination: Ashish Mahajan.

Production Assistance: Sohan Pal, Sanjeev Kumar, Aniruddha Shankar and Bhagwati Prasad.

Cybermohalla Project Co-Ordinators: Prabhat Kumar Jha (Ankur) and Jeebesh Bagchi (Sarai-CSDS).

CD: Mrityunjay Chatterjee (Design), Ashish Mahajan (Sound Design), Parvati Sharma and Shveta Sarda (Video).

Designed and produced at the Sarai Media Lab, CSDS.