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Far from Home: Celebrated Bollywood Actor Naseeruddin Shah Joins as Executive Producer to Spotlight Afghan Refugees in India Mumbai, November 10, 2025 — Far from Home, a powerful short documentary shedding light on the plight of Afghan refugees in India, announces Bollywood icon Naseeruddin Shah as its Executive Producer. This marks the first time Mr. Shah has taken on an executive production role in a documentary, underscoring the film’s significance and urgent message. “I’ve always believed the most important function of cinema is to act as a record of its times. Since it is the only medium that can do that, I consider documentaries to be of more value for posterity than features,” said Naseeruddin Shah on joining the film. Directed by award-winning journalist Ankita M. Kumar, Far from Home tells the story of Samira Faizi, an Afghan refugee woman who arrived in India in 2021 following Afghanistan’s fall to the Taliban. The film explores Samira’s ongoing struggle to create a life amid a changing political landscape in India, which has become increasingly unfriendly to refugees. It examines the impact of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which excludes Muslim refugees from pathways to citizenship, leaving Afghan refugees like Samira in a precarious and indefinite limbo. “Refugee rights is a tricky topic in India, and given the current political scenario, refugees are scared to talk or come forth in public,” shared director Ankita M. Kumar. “I am proud of Samira for her bravery in telling her story and bringing awareness across the world about the situation of Afghan refugees in India. When one thinks of refugees, they usually visualize them on a boat going to Europe or on the US-Mexico border. But rarely do we talk about refugees in places where there is no framework to integrate them.” Ankita M. Kumar, born and raised in Mumbai and an alumnus of Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi, brings her deep journalistic expertise to the film. She has worked across leading publications including Deutsche Welle, POLITICO, and The Economist Group, earning numerous awards for excellence in reporting from organizations such as the SF Press Club, marks her directorial debut with Far from Home. She completed this project after receiving funding from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and the American Institute of Afghanistan Studies. Far from Home is produced by Emmy-winning producer Brent E. Huffman and supported by the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. It has been recognized at several prestigious events, including as a finalist for the Japan Prize and runner-up in the Best Short Documentary category at the Chicago South Asian Film Festival. The documentary has screened at Oscar-qualifying festivals such as the American Documentary and Animation Film Festival and Tasveer Film Festival. ` "I am so proud to be part of Far from Home, a powerful and vital documentary chronicling issues facing refugees and immigrants in India, Afghanistan, around the world. Ankita Kumar is a brave new voice in documentary film who is tirelessly working to spread awareness about the plight of people like Samira and her family to help their harrowing situation," Brent E. Huffman, Emmy-winning documentary filmmaker, director of the Netflix documentary, Saving Mes Aynak, winner of 40+ awards and broadcast in over 70 countries. The film is currently on an Oscar campaign for Best Short Documentary and will be showcased at multiple venues in Los Angeles in November, including the Rodeo Screening Room in Downtown Beverly Hills on November 22. Other screenings include the National Press Club in Washington DC on December 3 and San Francisco from December 5-7.