All Photographs by K. L. Kamat
First Online: September 10, 2000
Last Updated: August 20, 2024

Introduction

My heart feels heavy as I present these portraits of the poorest of the poor of India. My father documented these portraits, not for the Internet, not for the money or artistic effort, but with a sense of history in his mind. "In a few years, it will be hard for us to believe that we lived amongst people like these" he once wrote to me. The subjects in this series are mostly uneducated,  poor, and never been in front of a camera. Many were taken in deep forests of India where the technology was yet to make an impact. Innumerable times, after a person passed away, the relatives tracked down my father and had to request the only photograph of their loved ones. This website may be the only place that a record will exist of their existence. (No. India does not have an identification system).

 Is place in history, a privilege of the rich? 

-VK

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